Devil Story
Devil Story (French: Il était une fois... le diable, lit. 'Once upon a time... the devil'), is a 1986 French Nazisploitation[1] horror film written and directed by Bernard Launois. It is his seventh and last feature film.[2] An uneven mixture of the slasher and Euro-gothic genres, it was largely condemned by critics for its incoherent script and technical incompetence.[3] It has since gained a cult following because of its reputation as one of the worst films in history.[2][4] PlotA seemingly deranged murderer in a Schutzstaffel uniform with a disfigured spine and pig-like[3] face terrorises a rural area of Normandy and slaughters whomever he encounters at random—first a couple of campers, then a man asking for directions to the nearest gas station. A couple's car breaks down on the road, and they decide to stay at a nearby hotel until they can repair their car. The hotel is a modified old castle run by an elderly man and woman. The younger couple learn from their hosts that the place is cursed. ReceptionAfter initially released in 1986 in only a small number of theatres in French provinces, the film was shown in Paris as a double feature at Le Brady , under the title Il était une fois... le diable.[2] In Spinegrinder: The Movies Most Critics Won't Write About, author and critic Clive Davies described the film as "75 mins [sic] of near-catatonic nonsense" with "a dumb, circular ending".[5] Scott Aaron Stine wrote in his The Gorehound's Guide to Splatter Films of the 1980s: "Despite the charming contrivances, [Devil Story] is just one more reason why French cinema rarely ventures or strays into splatter territory".[3] Lexikon des internationalen Films, a German-language reference work on all theatrical films and many television films released in Germany since 1945, noted the film's homages to John Carpenter's 1980 film The Fog.[6] Home mediaThe film was released on VHS by a French company called American Vidéo in the late 1980s.[2] The film was restored in 4K resolution from its 35mm original camera negative and released on Blu-ray by Vinegar Syndrome, an American home video distribution company, in 2021.[4][7] This restored version was screened at the Fantastic Fest, an annual film festival in Austin, Texas, US, in September 2021.[8] References
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