Nightmare City

Trailer—Nightmare City

source: Nightmare City

The reporter Dean Miller (Hugo Stiglitz) is assigned with his cameraman to interview a scientist that is arriving in the local airport. While waiting for the arrival, an unidentified Hercules makes an emergency landing and is surrounded by a military force. When the doors open, a legion of blood thirsty creatures commanded by the scientist attack the soldiers, killing them with hatchets and drinking their blood. Dean tries to warn the population about the happening but is censored by General Murchison (Mel Ferrer). Later the military leaders discover that the creatures have not come from the outer space, but are human beings contaminated by radiation and needing to drink blood to stay undead. Dean unsuccessfully calls his wife Dr. Anna Miller (Laura Trotter) and heads to the hospital where she works, trying to escape from the city crowded of the increasing walking dead creatures. The trash "Incubo Sulla Città Contaminate" a.k.a. "City of the Walking Dead" or "Nightmare City" is a weird horror movie that could be better and better with a best selection of the lead couple. The uptight Hugo Stiglitz is not tailored for the role of hero and is an awful selection from the producers, and Laura Trotter is too stupid for a doctor, recalling those women from the 40's or 50's that used to scream in every dangerous situation and run to the arms of the hero. The killers are not zombies like in "The Last Man on Earth" or the way George A. Romero has become famous in "Night of the Living Dead", with slow and gruesome movements, but actually a kind of unbeatable "warrior vampire" with appearance of zombie. My vote is six. Title (Brazil): Not Available

Better known for his jungle cannibal opus "Make Them Die Slowly", Lenzi has here a much more accomplished and entertaining gut muncher. On an unassuming day, a nuclear scientist is supposed to arrive with important research. His plane breaks flight patterns and lands unannounced. When authorities go to investigate, they find all the people on board are infected with strange kind of radiation poisoning and have turned into violent, cannibalistic zombies. The zombies then begin attacking any and every one in sight; hacking, shooting and eating all they can. Escaping the city is the only hope. Coming out in 1980, this was pretty late in the cannibal/zombie movie cycle. Fortunately, Lenzi changes up the formula just enough to keep things from being stale. The zombies are are fast, intelligent and have no problem utilizing tools and weapons. Lenzi also ad hears to just enough genre clichés to keep fans happy. There is blood and gore aplenty, random flashes of nudity and some wonderfully cheesy dialogue. On the technical side, the film is right on par with other films in the same category. Acting ranges from to OK to plain bad, lighting and sound get the job done but never excel, and the writing works well enough to move from point A to point B. One nice element is the pacing, which is refreshingly brisk and free of clutter. Over all, this is one of the better made and more amusing of the cannibal/zombie films from days gone by. Genre fans should check it out. 7/10

After this opened in my local movie theater they posted a sign stating " No Refunds Based on Quality Of Film being Shown " I saw it 3 times that weekend! As soon as the credits started to roll and all the foreign names appeared on the screen...people burst out laughing!!! I love these types of films and went to see them all the time. I started to purchase these on DVD and VHS. the Gates of hell was a classic!! best line " Dunwich a terrible place of death and doom " Christopher George " Yes..but how do we get there?? " Classic. House by the Cematry.." Dr Freudstien " a great combination of Sigmund Freud and Frankenstien....I love it!!

Hello Lenzi-fans. I think that many people out there with love for trashy italian cinema will agree with me that Umberto Lenzis "nightmare city" is one of the most enjoyable semi-zombie flicks of the genre. I say "semi-zombie" because Signor Lenzi himself does not approve of the label "zombies" given to the maniacal humans running around constantly in the movie on a loose killing rampage. According to Lenzi they are only "methaphorically" to be called zombies. The statement itself may seem laughable, when you actually see what is going on in this movie. Of course it is important to remark that this movie and its statements are typical for many films of the late 70-ties with the message of nature revenging itself upon the careless ways we humans treat the world (with reference to movies like ORCA-THE KILLER WHALE). In the case of "Nightmare City" an unspecified disaster has occurred on a nuclear power plant. The protagonist played by the very stiff mexican actor Hugo Stiglitz, is a reporter that in the beginning of the movie is taking off for the airport to cover a news story. A professor Hagenback from the nuclear power plant is due to arrive in the airport and inform the world of what the hell happened at the atomic plant. While we wait, an unidentified plane is arriving to the airport. Nobody identifies themselves on the plane, and an army platoon is getting ready to enter the plane. The suddenly the door opens and the evil looking Professor steps heavily out on the stairs...tension music begins....AND THEN: Fierce stabbing from Hagenback at the army man standing in front of him. And suddenly mad humans with some paté-looking makeup is coming out of the plane in big numbers with weapons and KILLS KILLS KILLS. And the killing just goes on forever... Throughout the movie Hugo Stiglitz manages to stay alive with his wife, and killing more zombies than anyone in the movie. I will not give the ending away here, for those of you who have not seen this piece of exciting and fun trash, but i rather enjoyed the construction of the ending, although i know many will not agree with me. Even Quentin Tarantino has said that Nightmare City is the ZOMBIE-movie favorite of his. A special thing about these zombies are that they are GODDAMN fast. Forget about running away from some slow deadbeat zombies. These ones are armored with machineguns and lots of sharp weapons. They are even much more efficient than the spanish military personel that are supposed to fight them off. Even when the army is ordered to shoot the contaminated bastards in the head, they do just the opposite. Through the entire movie we actually never see some efficiancy from the army. Umberto Lenzi has made some fine fast-paced poliziotteschi flicks, so i guess thats why we see zombies running around like bloodhungry criminals. I have to say that if you wish to buy this movie on dvd, then be sure to get the version with AUDIO COMMENTARY on. This is simply one of the worst, laughable commentaries i have ever heard. And yes, Signor Lenzi whose english sucks, is doing it IN ENGLISH. First of all there are long pauses of 10 to 20 minutes where he doesnt mention a single word. When he does say something, it is mainly some stupid comments like "we see two women walking down into the basement, what you think will happen next?" and "Are you happys?" yes, he does say HAPPYS. It is a must hear and see. Oh yeah, and if you are on the lookout for poor man versions of actors you already know, then look among the paté-faced zombies, and you will find crappy versions of Donald Pleasence, Peter Jackson, and Bob Hoskins. and many more depending on your imagination... MY FAVORITE UMBERTO LENZI FILM.....

You can't honestly give any excuses for this movie; it's just plain cheesy. You could say that it's just a horror movie and it shouldn't be taken seriously, but that's a lame excuse. This movie is just not good at all. From the terrible makeup fx to the hokey dialogue, there's not much of redeeming value in this movie. The plot itself is pretty humdrum. Hordes of the dead terrorize a big city while spreading their walking-dead disease to others. The only interesting part of this movie is how it tries to follow several groups of people and their encounters with the zombies. Among the people whose stories are followed are a military major and his wife, General and his daughter and son-in-law and last but not least, a reporter and his wife. The best sub-story is that of the reporter who witnesses the start of the mayhem firsthand and attempts to break the story of the walking dead, while people turn a deaf ear to his reports. The reporter tries to stay alive and rescue his wife from the chaos. Hugo Stiglitz is great as the reporter kicks some major butt, especially near the movie's end. The rest of the substories that the movie oscillates between are boring and pedestrian though. The "zombies" in this movie are decidedly some of the more active ones in movie history. They run, jump and even use weapons. Some of them actually look like living humans, except they have some ghastly scare. "City of the Walking Dead" was a badly chosen title; "City of the Running, Jumping and Scampering Dead" sounds more apt. You could argue that they are far more lifelike that the people in this movie, especially the military guys, who apparently are too damn stupid to follow the advice of their superiors and shoot the zombies in the head. The movie isn't too scary at all. There are some genuinely creepy moments, such as when the reporter's wife fumbles around in the dark in a hospital and encounters one of the walking dead. That was one of the only chilling parts of the movie. The scene where the major finds his wife is also pretty creepy, although it was predictable. For the most part, the gore was nothing that hasn't been done better in other movies, although the lively zombies did make them considerably more vicious. The makeup was really terrible. Most of the zombies look like normal humans, except for a little blood here and there and a crazed look in their eyes. It would have been best if the filmmakers went with that look for the whole movie, as the makeup jobs usually consisted of a few cheesy cast-like extensions and mud-like molds being added to creature faces. City of the Walking Dead is a decent movie to watch if you aren't took picky with your horror movies. It has some decent action and some novel concepts that were extremely flawed in implementation. Otherwise, stay far away from this one. Furthermore, a word of warning: you will groan at the movie?s ending.

While not to be entirely dismissed as drivel, Lenzi's would-be zombiefest known as NIGHTMARE CITY nonetheless comes off as trying to be too different, too "off-the-beaten-zombie-path", and as result, ends up falling flat in an unsatisfying mix of missed opportunities. Instead of going with "living dead"-style zombies (i.e. lumbering oafs) Lenzi - against producers wishes who wanted basically a Romero-style-clone - instead argued for and got his wish of the 'zombies' simply being victims of a nuclear radiation accident. All the 'creatures' become supermen of sorts - with heightened strength etc. - not to mention retaining their human faculties of running, driving, being able to fight with weapons etc. As a result though - pretty much all suspense is thrown out the window, as the movie quickly bogs down into a violent and graphic game of hide and seek. The action is intense (and the blood and gore plentiful) but the 'creatures' or victims simply look like poorly-designed Halloween costume party attendees, who - after realizing they are late for their scheduled gathering - grabbed whatever they could out of their fridge and slapped it on their faces. The result is an unconvincing and inconsistent mess of effects that underwhelms the viewer. Some victims have little makeup, others are nearly indistinguishable under piles of green and red facial clay, (yet ALL sneer menacingly at the camera) and ALL are out for the blood of their next human victim (the creatures need blood to regenerate their cells to keep living. As a result, their victims in turn become creatures as well). While I applaud Lenzi for at least attempting something different (in an interview on the disk, he explains how he wanted the film to be viewed as an environmental warning etc.) it comes down to the simple fact that the movie ends up failing - the zombies move too fast to be truly creepy and come off as poorly-dressed terrorists from a bad Chuck Norris movie - and basically plays out as a b-level gore bore, weaker on the gore, heavier on the B-bore. While NIGHTMARE CITY may not be totally rank, let's say ya might wanna drink that milk today - know what I mean?? As in, it smells a little funny - not totally spoiled, but nowhere near fresh-enough to serve to guests. Feelin' lucky?? Recommended for genre completists only.

Thank you George A. Romero!! If it wasn't for your zombiefilms like `Night of the Living Dead' and `Dawn of the Dead', we never would have received all these fun Italian rip-offs. Umberto Lenzi was the man responsible for this `Nightmare City'. Lenzi is an enthusiast schlock-director with an unhealthy obsession for blood and guts. Within a period of only two years, he made 3 Italian gore classics including this one, `Eaten Alive' and – top of the bill – the notorious `Cannibal Ferox'. The latter is shocking…this film is just fun! An apocalyptic horror film with non-stop action and an constantly growing army of superzombies! Zombies according to Lenzi are a bit more energetic than usual…They drive cars and use guns! Technically, they're aren't even zombies but radioactively contaminated victims of a nuclear accident. They arrive in an airplane and soon, the whole city is infested. The make-up effects are so cheap and nasty it almost becomes hilarious. It seems like the zombies' heads are covered in mud and you can almost smell their rotting flesh. Lots of heads are being shot off and multiple throats are being slit…perfect entertainment if you're a horror lover in other words. Don't bother if you're an opinionated horror-hater or an amateur-critic, though. I'll spare you the effort: the script of `Nightmare City' is as weak as they come (with a very disappointing ending) and the acting is atrocious. If you're a diehard horror-freak with a soft spot for Italian cult, however, this will be one of the most pleasing films you'll ever see.

Sure it may seem ridiculous to modern audiences, but it is important to remember this film was made several years before the Geneva Convention outlawed the use of knives and hatchets by zombies, as well as such zombie subterfuge tactics as cutting phone lines and sneaking up on people and choking them with a bit of rope, and the implementation of spear-guns. This is actually all quite historically accurate.