Friday 5 March 2010

The Beyond

Does the final scene of The Beyond in some way refer to Sodom, Gomorrah and Lot's Wife looking back?

7 comments:

Wes said...

Very interesting reading of the scene Keith, I never condidered that. I think that scene is a really good depiction of an otherworldly nothingness - its not overdone, just right. Fulci does enjoy a cruel ending - what is your take on that last shot of City of the Living Dead, where the boy runs towards the camera and the image appears to shatter ?

Peter Santellan said...

That is a good way to look at that final scene in The Beyond.

Aylmer said...

I don't know about biblical references in Fulci movies. Being an Italian catholic, I guess it's unavoidable to a certain extent. The Beyond (and that last scene) has always just screamed HPL to me.

Pidde Andersson said...

To me, that final scene is clearly inspired by medieval artists Bruegel and Bosch, and their depictions of Hell.

And I guess the ending of CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD isn't inspired by anything at all. "Hey, Dardano! Do you know how to end this thing?" - "Nope." - "Me neither." - "Let's just end it."

K H Brown said...

I'm not that familiar with Breughel, but what I have seen of Bosch would support your reading Pidde: The sense that Bosch's triptych of hell, for instance, has no persepective or anchoring point.

City of the Living Dead is, to me, a situation where they just had to provide an ending.

I agree on the Lovecraft aspect as well: If the book is Eibon, the landscape might be Carcosa; it's certainly a non Euclidean geometry.

Aylmer said...

Agreed on both the Boschian feel of that final scene in The Beyond, and that the last shot of COTLD was made up on the spot.

Pidde Andersson said...

K H, thanks for correcting my spelling og Breughel; I didn't bother to check how to spell it before I posted. It's not a name I write every day. Or year.