ObscureCinema101 THE DEAD PIT is a movie that seems to divide people on whether they like it or not. Straight zombie fans say it's too slasher-esque in the middle. Straight slasher fans dislike the zombie angle. I happen to be both, so I quite enjoyed it.Dr. Colin Ramzi is a psychotic scientist who experiments on the patients at the mental institution he works for. His associate, Dr. Swan, has had enough, so he confronts him in his basement laboratory, shoots him in the head, and throws him in the pit where he stored the dead bodies. Twenty years later, a woman who calls herself Jane Doe enters the institution because the doctors say she has amnesia, yet she knows her memory was taken from her. She manages to befriend one patient by the name of Chris, who's in there for his habit of building bombs (Golly, I'll bet that won't come in handy later in the film!). Well, after a large earthquake, Dr. Ramzi and all the corpses in the dead pit awaken and wreak havoc on the hospital. Can Jane and Chris save the day? I liked THE DEAD PIT. The movie had a lot of good things going for it, even though it doesn't fully utilize some of its potential, but as it stands, it's a fun ride. All the actors were pretty good, with the exception of Cheryl Lawson as Jane. She's fine during scenes where she just has to talk, but in her "emotional" scenes, like crying and such, she was horrible. She was a good screamer, though, and she was easy on the eyes, but she began to really get on my nerves after a while.THE DEAD PIT is a very well-made movie as well. Director Brett Leonard obviously knew what he was doing, and it's no surprise he went on to do bigger things like direct the sci-fi film THE LAWNMOWER MAN. Leonard uses lots of fog and colored lights to build atmosphere, and he does so surprisingly well.The gore is also top-notch, especially during a period where the MPAA basically neutered a lot of these gore films. There's a lot of gory brain-munching, head-drilling, and decapitations, courtesy of Dr. ramzi and co.While the last forty or so minutes are pure zombie-filled bliss, the previous hour was one half characterization and one half stalk 'n' slash with some pretty good and nasty kills. This seems to annoy people expecting a straight-forward zombie movie, but I liked it.Of course, the film does have its flaws. There are some obvious miniatures, especially near the end, but personally, the added to the fun for me. There are some slow parts, but that doesn't take too much out of it. There's also a REALLY obvious "twist" that I guessed in the first fifteen minutes.Overall, THE DEAD PIT is a really fun movie that plays it straight, yet with a sense of fun all throughout. It's gory, occasionally funny (for both intended and unintended reasons), and some the characters are likable. Dr. Ramzi is a great villain, and the zombie effects are great as well.Check it out.

Alucard Venom I saw "The Dead Pit" first time some 15 years ago and since late at night on television. I couldn't remember the title until few years ago, and recently I manage to find it on DVD.Surprisingly magic is still there. Without getting too much into plot, movie is about doctor who performs illegal brain surgeries until his college kills him for moral reasons, sealing him into his "Dead Pit". Twenty years after, Jane Doe (girl who lost her memories) comes into the very same hospital. Soon after, earthquake crack the wall of "Dead Pit" and good old doctor comes back to life, unleashing his horde of undead.I don't know why many people complain about this movie, seems they are forgetting that this is '80 low budget movie (times when literally everything you thought of could be put on screen). It's a descent '80 zombie flick, bit unusual because of it's narrative style and nightmarish atmosphere it has. It was a first feature of now well known director Brett Leonard, who manage to capture otherworldly atmosphere in what is now considered cult classic. His obvious influences are Wes Craven and his Elm Street (director acknowledged this in audio commentary for Dead Pit DVD). Story gets bit spread here and there, but it never gets too confusing nor it tries to be more then it actually is - a low budget horror flick.Altho movie starts bit slow (but it has some nice scenes to keep you interested for the first half of the movie), it really comes to life in second half when all hell breaks lose and zombies start to rampage through asylum. Characters aren't deeply developed, but they are interesting enough to keep you watching at screen (good looking Cheryl Lawson helps in that department. Did I mention she walks around in her underwear most of the time?)SF goes from terrific to silly, but most of the time, they are looking quite good, especially when it comes to gore scenes. It's bloody and will satisfy every zombie fan, because FX here have all the necessary requirement for good zombie gorefest. Highlight of this little flick are cinematography, which was really well done and music score, which goes from moody to creepy. (Cheryl Lawson looks are also big highlight of this movie.)Bad: Some scenes are bit longer then they should be, some plot elements that aren't really needed and bit corny ending, and "innovative" way of killing zombies that might cause laugh for hardcore zombie fans.Overall, it's a descent flick, worth checking out if you are fan of horror movies and for some reason you haven't seen it already.

BA_Harrison Confident direction and a good deal of atmosphere cannot disguise the fact that The Dead Pit, the debut from director Brett Leonard, makes very little sense. The film's confusing narrative sees a beautiful young amnesiac experiencing a series of horrifying hallucinations and nightmares whilst staying at an institution for the mentally ill. But what the poor girl doesn't realise is that the bloody surgeon that is haunting her dreams is actually real, the reanimated spirit of a murderous doctor who was walled up in the asylum basement twenty years earlier. Freed by a recent earthquake, the nasty doc is out to complete his gory experiments whilst seeking revenge on the psychiatrist who entombed him.Quite how the malevolent doc is able to return to life is never adequately explained; neither is what he is trying to achieve with his messy work, or how he manages to remain invisible to everyone but Jane (the identity chosen by our forgetful heroine), And with far too many contrivances necessary to wrap the whole affair up tidily for the finalé, the film is just too far-fetched for its own good.The silly ending expects the viewer to suspend belief as it reveals that a) the killer surgeon is actually Jane's father b) the surgeon is able to command an army of zombies c) the zombies can only be destroyed with holy water d) a huge water tower stands over the asylum e) one of the patients is a demolition expert f) another is a nun and knows how to consecrate water, and g) the raw materials for a bomb can be found in the asylum's workshop!!! It doesn't take a genius to figure out what is going to happen, or to realise that such a string of coincidences are astronomically unlikely (that's the understatement of the century).On a positive note, lead actress Cheryl Lawson is very tasty and spends much of the film running around in a pair of white panties and a cropped T-shirt so flimsy that in one scene it is torn from her body by water from a hose. Leonard also sees fit to include some fairly decent gore to liven things up a little, but the gratuitous female flesh and bloody effects still aren't enough to detract from the lousy storytelling.Director Leonard would go on to have some success with his Stephen King adaptation The Lawnmower Man, but his career seems to have gone into a nosedive recently after giving sci-fi fans what is reputed to be the worst of the Highlander franchise (and boy, it must be really bad to stink more than the second one!).

choppyno Brett Leonard (Lawnmower Man, Hideaway) gives us in his directorial debut a pastiche of De Moro's HELLHOLE and Fulci's CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD, and it holds it's own with those two heavy-weights from opposite poles of the extreme-film spectrum. This movie has raving mental patients, psychotic doctors, people being buried alive, ritual murders in boiler rooms, flesh-hungry zombies, high-quality gore effects, and hot women. Very atmospheric for taking place in a clichéd setting = a mental asylum. Probably the creepiest one caught on film. There are dead bodies all over this movie. Amazing dialog like this doesn't hurt either: -"My God! You're a Doctor! You're supposed to be saving lives!" -"I've done life. Now I'm doing death." Not a disappointment for zombie fans looking for something different, or slasher fans doing the same. Solid. A must see.