THE BLACK GATE (2017) Reviews and overview

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The Black Gate is a 2017 French fantasy horror film about two siblings and three gangsters who are caught up in a gateway to Hell.

Directed by Guillaume Beylard and producer Fabrice Martin from a screenplay written by the latter, the movie stars Nicolas Couchet, Jeanne Dessart and Jonathan Raffin.

Plot:
Sarah (Jeanne Dessart) and David (Nicolas Couchet) lost their parents at a young age. They were murdered while visiting Uncle Simon (Michel Coste) a scientist who also dabbles in black magic. Having been sent to different orphanages they were only recently reunited. Sarah receives a grimoire book from her uncle displaying misunderstanding contents. Sarah asked David to go with her to their uncle to find some answers.

At the same time, three mobsters are attempting to escape the authorities after a bank robbery. All of them will be trapped in a freaky situation that leads them to the depths of Hell. Death, destruction and the awakening of the Beast will follow!

Reviews:
“While it tries to bite off more than it can chew in terms of its limited budget attempting a far grander scale than it could pull off, the action and atmosphere here do enough to counteract that so it’s somewhat watchable enough at least. Those with an appreciation for these kinds of low-budget films or are intrigued by what’s happening here can do far worse than this one…” Don’s World of Horror and Exploitation

“While it takes a little bit to get used to, if you give this film a chance to warm up it can be very viscerally disturbing and an effective little genre film. It’s the kind of film where you look and see the serious potential that’s on display and want to know what would happen if you gave these people access to a larger budget and better filming equipment.” Movie Meister Reviews

“The story is nonsensical at times, yet there is such an urgent energy throughout this that it really doesn’t matter. From robed demons, to evil mirror creatures, alternate dimensions, zombie hordes, and black magic this film fits in a lot to stop things getting stale. Might not be the best-made film in the world, but boy did I find it entertaining.” The Rotting Zombie

The Black Gate works quite beautifully, really, it’s full of impressive and creepy imagery, it doesn’t shy away from gruesomeness, gets gory in all the right places, keeps its tension throughout, and has just the necessary air of mystery to it as well. A really cool piece of genre cinema, actually.” Search My Trash

“Obviously a labour of love, The Black Gate took six years to go from idea to finished film. The result is a fun homage to the golden age of Italian horror film, right down to the Goblinesque soundtrack. Unlike many of them though it’s subtitled rather than dubbed and the subtitles are a bit wonky in their translations at times. Overall though, if you liked the originals you should have fun with this.” Voices from the Balcony

Cast and characters (alphabetical):
Christian Barbier … The director of the orphanage /A living dead
Les BlackCatz … The zombies of the final scene
Antony Cinturino … Franck
Benjamin Combettes … Diego
Michel Coste … Simon Vallmore
Nicolas Couchet … David
Jeanne Dessart … Sarah
Patricia Flecher … The mother
Charles Gréa … The hermit priest of the village
Carl Laforêt … Abomination
Jaques Langlois … The doctor
Marcus … A zombie
Jonathan Raffin … Jeff
Patrick Sage … The mysterious stranger

MOVIES and MANIA rating:

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