Italian director Domiziano Cristopharo (House of Flesh Mannequins, Doll Syndrome), takes advantage of the lockdown period to direct among the domestic The House Guest, a supernatural horror, ghost story played by Daniele Arturi, his roommate.
Unlike the films and short films made by other filmmakers during the period of enforced isolation due to Covid-19, The House Guest is, more than boredom, the result of the talent and strong directorial and effetistic skills of Domiziano Cristopharo, who demonstrates that the absent budget, an improvised actor, the difficulties dictated by the pandemic, and his own home used as a location, do not stand in the way of his creativity in the slightest.
In 2014, Domiziano Cristopharo amazed with his Red Krokodil, extreme drug drama "krokodil" shot on a budget of only 1,000 euros. Today the director still surprises with his The House Guest, no-cost horror film of which he not only directs but also handles the cinematography, sound design, special effects and practical effects (Athanasius Pernath), even making a brief appearance.
Engaging and evocative, The House Guest does not suffer from any limitations because it is built on solid foundations, including the screenplay signed by Domiziano Cristopharo himself in collaboration with Andrea Cavaletto (Doll Syndrome, The Transparent Woman, Xpiation) but above all on the film culture and great experience of the director combined with his unfailing and distinct personal touch.
In The House Guest the "haunted house," a staple theme of horror cinema, a treasured location that has no defined or classifiable time and place given the multitude of titles (even cornerstones of the genre) centered on haunted houses or the house portrayed as a place where horror lurks, is revived.
The film also features many references to the cinema of the 1980s, both domestic and otherwise, bringing to mind especially that of Lucio Fulci (Fear in the City of the Living Dead), the filmography of Pupi Avati but also Sam Raimi (The House), Jean-Paul Ouellette (The Creature), Damiano Damiani (Amityville Possession), Frank Henenlotter (Basket Case), not leaving out a small homage to the ghosts of j-horror as well.
The House Guest is thus a nostalgic plunge into the past that pushes the viewer even further back in the decades to the point of touching 5 Tombs for a Medium (1965) by Massimo Pupillo but it is also a valuable story in which nightmares and hallucinations are intertwined with the medieval Inquisition and the theme of doubles.
Daniele Arturi is perfectly at home in this difficult setting and plays a character who, subjugated by the house (an ancient place of worship of the Sand Cardinal), becomes the victim of terrifying visions during which flourish, copious, impressive practical effects combined with CGI that nourish the most splatter sequences (the shower during which the body melts with melting effects, the crushing of boils, the flaying of facial skin, the shards of glass pulled out of the foot, the ripped abdomen, the tears of blood, the slashed wrists).
Featuring a good amount of suspense and a very atmospheric story, The House Guest joins life with death and the past with the present, seducing the viewer with a horror that, at first veiled, overwhelms thanks to an unreal atmosphere and murky sound design and then bursts in with delirious visions in which monsters, blood and revenge reign.
With this film Domiziano Cristopharo abandons the extreme strand to put on pure horror, the kind in vogue in the 1980s. The House Guest Indeed, it seems to have come out of that decade, and if it did, it would be considered cult today.
Plot: Daniel is a lonely student who moves into a new apartment where strange phenomena lead him to believe that the suicide of the previous tenant was caused by the presence of a very vengeful ghost.
