Alex Chandon
Cradle Of Fear

"...A movie with Dani Filth?!!" That was the first thing I thought after watching the horrible trailer for "Cradle Of Fear", a film conceived by director Alex Chandon practically specifically for the well-known rock star and voice of the English metal band Cradle Of Filth. Well, yes! The British director, after shooting the promo video for the group "From The Cradle To Enslave", decided to have the ambiguous singer star in this horror-splatter film, while also reserving cameo roles for the other band members. Among the other actors present in the film is that David McEwen (R.I.P. 2005), a friend of the six English metalheads who also participated as a narrator at the beginning of the video for "Her Ghost In The Fog".

In short, the film might seem like a gathering of old friends just to have some fun, and indeed it is, with the consequent poor quality that results. Fans of Cradle will watch this film with their mouths watering, jumping out of their seats at each appearance of Dani, accompanied, to make everything even more appealing, by a soundtrack composed largely of tracks from the album "Midian", so much so that it could actually be called a real C.O.F. film. Otherwise, the film is a succession of splatter scenes and others bordering on pornography up to the fetish limits (for the more meticulous, I mention the scene of the intercourse between a busty girl and her legless husband, with her passionately kissing and licking the stump), overshadowing the plot, which is structured into four episodes centered on the figure of the assassin and cannibal Kemper (David McEwen), locked in a maximum-security criminal asylum, but who manages to communicate with the mysterious "the Man" (Dani Filth), a sort of Satanist with dark powers who roams England horribly killing the victims designated to him by Kemper, that is, those who contributed to his arrest. His victims include a drug addict in search of ever more extreme experiences, a disloyal thief, a selfish one-legged man ready to kill to get one, a maniac who enjoys watching scenes of death and torture on the internet, and many others, in a triumph of rivers of blood, entrails scattered everywhere, all spiced up by the presence of Playboy centerfold-type girls constantly in skimpy outfits and sometimes borderline sadomasochistic.

The suspense is practically nonexistent: everyone, while watching the film, knows at any moment what is about to happen, because events unfold in an utterly banal way and it's almost laughable to see the great (... well, perhaps better: the small) Dani wandering dark streets among prostitutes, robbers, thugs, and anything more you can think of, clad in his unmistakable cyber-dark stage attire and tons of rings and fake metal claws smashing skulls, opening bellies and spreading intestines on the ground: "masterful" and exemplifying is the scene where our guy sacrifices a meowing cat to the Devil in his typical style, making his undistorted voice heard for a moment (ah, yes, the film wasn't dubbed in Italian, so you can only catch it in English or French, as it was judged too violent by the "competent" authorities, only to then broadcast ambiguous vibrating ring commercials and other amenities in the early-evening time slot, màh..), or the scene where the "magical" Dani, upon seeing two girls who are about to become his victims, starts licking his lips in a pure Fantozzi style!

In short, this is the classic movie to watch when you really have nothing better to do, preferably in the company of friends to share abundant and hearty laughs over the gaudiness of a film that paradoxically is elevated precisely thanks to Dani's "unforgettable" performance, which you will particularly enjoy only if you're a metalhead or at least know the Cradle (it's not necessary to love them, really, in fact, if you hate them you might find it even more amusing!), otherwise for you, this film will probably just be yet another example of cinematic garbage.

2, then, and not 1, for the lovely afternoon among friends I spent watching it, laughing and joking.