Mausoleum (1983)

Just what I expected

The acting in this movie is really good.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

I tend to like 1980's horror films. They were a part of my youth. Alas, Mausoleum is not a good one, although there are a couple points of interest. The film boasts a cool looking monster, which was later reused with a couple of minor altercations in the Unnameable movies (make up artist Christopher Biggs worked on both films). The lighting effects in the crypt sequences do generate some nice atmosphere (dig the green light). Oh, and Bobbi Bresee (a pretty but wooden actress) is topless three times in the movie. However, these pluses cannot compensate for awkward pacing issues and a really dumb script that appears to be a first draft. This demon, who slumbers in the mausoleum, possess the first born female of one family. That is providing the first born comes into the mausoleum. Here is a suggestion, if the demon cannot possess anyone unless she comes into the mausoleum, then DON'T GO INTO THE MAUSOLEUM. One could move their family to another state or, at the very least, one could find another cemetery to burying her loved ones other than the one housing the cursed mausoleum. In addition to being slow and silly, there are also some questionable stereotypes. The film throws in a "funny" black maid with all the sensitivity of a 1940's B programmer giving the kids in the South some comic relief.There are worse horror films out there, but is that much of a recommendation? Buy the movie poster, skip the movie.

Susan Ferrell (Bresee) is drawn to a mausoleum in a cemetery that she enters, and is quickly possessed by a demon that has been in her family for years. Her maiden name is Nomed which is of course Demon backwards. Fully grown up, the demon inside her is awakening and she begins killing off anybody she wishes. The pesky Gardner (Sherbanee) is seduced by Susan, they have sex and then she transforms into a demon. Her eyes glow green and she hacks him up with a four clawed garden tool. Next is a delivery man who is killed when his head suddenly starts bleeding (you never really can tell what happens to him). A salesman in a mall is next. Her Aunt (Laura Hippe) is tossed off a balcony, and even her husband (Gortner, who completely sleepwalks through this role) is killed in gory fashion. Finally a friend of the family who happens to be a psychiatrist named Andrews (Burton) tries to exorcise the demon from Susan. This confusing mess makes no sense at all. The scenes are slapped together without the filmmakers caring if any of it made any sense. A dream sequence the husband has is effective and has some scary imagery but that is about it. Bobbie Bresee is topless and nude many times in this film and she is an eyeful, but a few more acting classes would have helped as you can clearly see in the scene where Andrews hypnotizes her. Her overacting is way over the top. The rest of the cast isn't much better and the sloppy Direction by Michael Dugan is also to blame. John Carl Buechler's make up design is highly inconsistent even though there were a few flashes of brilliance. The Demon's make up looks slightly different each time we see her. The final scene in the movie is the biggest head scratcher of them all involving the Gardner. It's not like any thing else made much sense but this end shot probably proves that everyone involved was on some serious drugs.

There seemed to be a lot of these movies, all probably in reaction to "The Exorcist" and "Rosemary's Baby" in latter-seventies. You can add this film to the list including The Car, The Wraith (with a young Charlie Sheen, if memory serves, The Herse and Devil's Rain. The Dunwich Horror... well... it fits in this category, but is almost too good to include. Besides, it at least has Sandra Dee! And now a SLIGHT spoiler warning as this has been mentioned in previous comments...The secret family name NOMED was a rather obvious plot hint. If I were marrying someone with that name, one of the first things -I- would probably realize was that it indeed was DEMON spelled backwards.I think I would insist on a hyphenated name. Like Susan Cthulu-Smythe or some-such.This film would probably be a good selection for a collection of films which are "so bad, they're good."

I haven't got the slightest idea what the hell the story of "Mausoleum" was all about, but it sure was fun to watch! This is another imbecile and over-the-top cheesy 80's horror flick about demonic possession with an awfully bad script and hilarious special effects. Around her 30th birthday, beautiful Susan starts to suffer from the ancient family curse that also caused her mother to die when Susan was ten. Now and whenever she feels demonic, Susan can light her eyes funky green and whatever poor soul she's focusing on dies a very unpleasant death. The script foresees absolutely no logic or suspense, and the only enjoyable sequences (apart from Bobbie Bresee's many nude-scenes) are the imaginative murders. Her elder sister, for example, is lift up over a balcony and her body is torn open while floating around! Quite gory, but not at all scary. The origin of the family curse remains vague and the whole climax is very, VERY lame. Not even an exorcism or a battle between demonic forces. There are about a million better films handling about demons and possession, but if you have a soft spot for low-budget 80's cheese, you might find "Mausoleum" mildly entertaining.