Michael_Elliott House of Clocks, The (1989) ** (out of 4) Fair later day Fulci film has three thugs breaking into the home of an elderly couple. The plan is to rob them but the couple end up dead and that's when the thugs learn that the couple has the power to turn back time with their magic clocks. This here was the second of Fulci's two made for TV flicks and it certainly a lot better than the first. As is to be expected, there's quite a bit a gore in the film ranging from a woman getting a pole stabbed into her middle regions, several shotgun blasts and a few other goodies. The performances are also better than I expected they would be but there's certainly no Oscar winners here. The biggest problem is certainly the screenplay, which is pretty simple and too the point. The idea of these clocks seeking revenge is a good one but the script needed a little bit more to pull it along. Fulci's direction is rather tired and laid back without too much style going for it. This certainly isn't among the director's best work and I'm sure the majority will find it quite horrid but having seen most of the director's later day films, I thought it was fair enough.

adriangr If you're still interested in watching any late 1980's movies by gore master Lucio Fulci, chances are you might want to add this to your list. Well, don't. It's another total turkey. As far as I can see, Fulci started a downward slide with "Manhattan Baby", and never recovered. I have seen "Aenigma" (a joke) "Touch of Death" (pitiful), "A Cat in the Brain" (nonsensical), "Voices From Beyond (snoozefest), and even sat through "The Ghosts of Sodom" (run as far as you can from this abomination), so I have no-one else to blame but myself for even giving "House of Clocks" a try. The plot is roughly this: An elderly couple inhabit a large mansion, and they are more than a little eccentric, by which I mean that from the very outset they are both seen to have homicidal tendencies! Into this situation drop three young petty criminals who have designs on stealing some loot from the treasure laden house. The twist is that the treasures of the house are all clocks, and when the violent youths meet the crazy old couple, the clocks themselves play a big part in what happens next... OK so what's wrong with this movie? Well basically, most of it. As with all of Fulci's later works it's hampered by everything that could possibly make a passable horror movie into a disaster. The acting is really poor. I've never seen such amateurish mugging and wailing as we get here from the three central youngsters. They are just terrible. A really, REALLY bad dubbing job only makes things worse, and English speaking dubbing team don't seem to have a clue about matching dialogue up to lip movements, there is barely a moment when the cast look like they are using their own voices. The elderly couple are just as bad, even though they don't ham it up, they are lumbered with an equally hopeless dub job. Sadly, the list of shame goes on. The direction and camera work are totally uninspired. Fulci has a few trademark images that he continues to roll out over and over again. Cameras mount staircases, zoom in on shadows or doorknobs, jump rapidly in focus from foreground to background and back again, etc etc. I've seen all these tricks a hundred times and the novelty has long since worn off. Worse still, the effects are now beyond lame. All the gore scenes (brief and not very explicit) are really poor, the effects are very shoddy and they just don't work. The non-gore special effects are equally terrible, and sadly this film relies on a few trick shots for important scenes, all of which are botched. It's like Fulci doesn't know how to make anything pass for realistic, or just doesn't care. But the very worst offender of all is the plot. Oh my god. Words fail me in trying to explain what's going on here. The film has a major supernatural twist and from the moment that everything in the house goes pear shaped (you'll know when), the film just unravels totally. Nothing works, nothing makes sense, nothing gets explained. Don't think I am just not getting it. I love surreal cinema and being made to think. But this is an insult. As stupid event followed stupid event I was almost laughing, but by the time the end credits rolled, I was wondering how this was ever passed off as serious entertainment, it's such a mess it's just not funny. Take my advice and don't go near this. I'm sorry to be so negative about Lucio Fulci when he has produced some of the genre's finest shockers, but his later films never repeated the success of the golden days, and this is just another example of him churning out pot-boilers when he had long since lost the ability or interest in making a good product.

Carrigon I had been a Fulci fan from watching Zombi, but I had never seen this title before. I saw the trailer on another DVD and thought it looked good. But, unfortunately, the trailer is better than the movie. It also gives away a lot of the gore.The basic plot: There is a really strange couple living in a big mansion filled with clocks and the bodies of their niece and nephew that are rotting in an odd chapel room. We soon discover that the maid has found the bodies and is so creeped out, she decides to leave. But she never makes it as the old woman kills her. And we find out she was maid number three. So right way, we know this couple is not what they appear to be.Then we have three con artist thieves who come along hoping to steal from the house. And that's when things get interesting. They kill the couple and their handyman only to find that no one ever really dies in that house.I thought a lot of the plot was good. Some of it was awful. There's one scene I just hated where the thieves suffocate a cat. And I found that to be irredeemable for this film, even though Fulci tries to make up for it at the end with an "undead cat's revenge" scene. I still hated it. And felt that was a real faulty script area. The entire ending seemed tacked on.The gore is excellent. And it's interesting that this was a made for TV movie in Europe in 1980 since it would never have made it past the US censors. We don't even get anything near as gory today. That alone is reason to watch this film.The creepiness of the house and the old couple was very good. The thieves were badly cast, stupid and inept.If you're curious about Fulci's other works, I would say watch it for that. I wouldn't really go so far as to call it an old gem, but it will keep you amused for awhile.I would like to see this remade at some point, updated. I think it has a lot of potential.

bensonmum2 A group of three unprofessionals attempt to rob the house of an elderly couple. It's an isolated place full of expensive items such as a large collection of clocks. The robbery goes all wrong and the old couple are each hit with a shotgun blast. One of the robbers notices that immediately following the couple's deaths, all of the clocks in the house have stopped. What none of them realizes is that the clocks begin to run backwards. Before the robbers realize what's happening, the clocks have turned back time and brought the couple back to life.Almost every review I've read on the internet seems to trash this movie. I don't get it. Other than Fulci's Don't Torture a Duckling and A Lizard in Woman's Skin, this is the best I've seen of his movies. The movie plays a bit like Twilight Zone meets Fulci. The story is original and innovative. Being Fulci, there is a certain amount of gore to be found (for example, an endless stream of entrails pouring from the maids stomach after she's been stabbed with a sharpened stick), but it never goes over-the-top. I found more tension here than in most of Fulci's films. Most of his work seems to be based on how to gross-out an audience. Here, he lets the story take center stage.A lot of the reviews I've read complain about the ending. I'll not give it away, I'll just say that it has a nice irony to me that I found satisfying. The three robbers are, after all, bad people. It's only fitting that they should not get away.The House of Clocks was apparently an Italian made-for-TV movie. They certainly don't make TV movies like this in America.