City of the Living Dead
A priest's death in the town of Dunwich opens a gateway to the dead. A psychic and a reporter race to close it before All Saints' Day as the town is overtaken by increasingly surreal supernatural events.
Film details
| Original / alt title | Paura nella città dei morti viventi; The Gates of Hell |
| Year | 1980 |
| Director | Lucio Fulci |
| Country | Italy |
| Runtime | Approx. 89 min |
| Main cast | Christopher George, Catriona MacColl, Janet Ågren, Carlo De Mejo |
UK status
A heavily censored Fulci title from the same era, though not one of the final prosecuted DPP 39.
Modern UK releases have restored the film and later editions have been classified 18.
Why it caused controversy
UK censorship / Video Nasties history
A quick status check first, followed by the film’s censorship timeline. A DPP prosecution was an obscenity case against a particular video publication — it was not automatically the same thing as a permanent nationwide “ban”.
Detailed censorship timeline & facts
FACTS & TRIVIA
- Also widely known as The Gates of Hell.
- Usually grouped with The Beyond and The House by the Cemetery as the Gates of Hell trilogy.
- Fabio Frizzi's score is a major part of its atmosphere.
- The story borrows the town name Dunwich from H. P. Lovecraft.
- British censorship records show several differently cut versions.
- It is one of Fulci's best-loved supernatural horrors.
- The film helped define Fulci's surreal approach to horror.
Distributor / VHS label
Archive cover shown is the user-supplied scan. UK distributor / VHS-label attribution varies by edition and is not asserted here without a verified sleeve imprint.
Trailer
Open a search for the original theatrical / VHS-era trailer. This keeps the archive linking to publicly available trailer sources rather than hosting copyrighted film footage.
▶ FIND ORIGINAL TRAILER
