The Gates of Hell (1980)

The Gates of Hell is famous for its puking-her-guts out scene, but the gore isn’t what drew us to this Italian horror film. In fact, as horror films go, gothic The Gates of Hell is rather tame when it comes to blood and gore. What creeped us out most about The Gates of Hell was the mysterious comings and goings of a priest’s ghost and the sudden appearance of a dead woman in a bedroom window. The Gates of Hell is a definite heart-stopper.

Plot summary for The Gates of Hell:
A priest hangs himself in a church cemetery of a small England town. In doing so, he causes the gates of Hell to open, unleashing the dead. From there it’s a race against time for a New York City reporter, a psychic and another couple who must journey to the small town and close the gates before All Saints Day. Should they fail, the dead would roam the Earth and kill everyone living. No pressure!

Memorable scene from The Gates of Hell:
The Gates of Hell contains one of the most spooktacular death scenes in horror movie history. It begins with a couple seeing the ghost of the dead priest as they’re in a barn for some hanky-panky. The girl starts to cry blood and pukes up her digestive system. She then squashes her boyfriend’s brain. Tasty.

Memorable quote from The Gates of Hell:
“Good thing he didn’t hang himself in Arlington!”

Why we love The Gates of Hell:
We all love to watch horror films that shock and scare us. The Gates of Hell will certainly shock and scare your friends. The monsters of The Gates of Hell aren’t just zombies. They are zombies AND ghosts. That’s more than enough to send a chill up our spines. Plus, it’s just kind of a gross movie with gratuitous shots of the nastiness – and Socreepy LOVES that!

Frightening Fact:
One of the most memorable scenes in Lucio Fulci’s The Gates of Hell, the intestine-vomiting scene, was achieved by having the actress swallow still-warm sheep entrails, then regurgitate them on camera. A fake head was used to get extreme closeup shots of guts flying out of the woman’s mouth.