Lo Squartatore di New York (The New York Ripper) (1982)

Fulci's most corrosive vision

The acting is bad, the dubbing atrocious, and the dialogue is even worse.

The New York Ripper is one of Lucio Fulci's last great films. What I love about this film is that it's a drastic departure from Fulci's previous Gates Of Hell Trilogy which started with The Beyond followed by The House By The Cemetery and concluded with City Of The Living Dead. The New York Ripper is a mix between detective fiction and slasher film. Lucio Fulci's The New York Ripper is an underrated film from the godfather of gore. But it's understandable as to why it is viewed as garbage. The film is not for the faint of heart, as it's sexually violent, obscene in some parts. But there are a few well constructed scenes of tension and horror. Though Fulci's glory days were behind him at this point of his career. He managed to direct an intense slasher film that makes Friday The 13th look like a Disney film. Fulci's use of gore is relentless and he delivers it in spades. The film was marketed with the tagline: "The most controversial movie ever made". Well, it's definitely one of the most disturbing of the slasher films out there. Fulci fans will love it, common viewers will despise it, and dismiss it. The New York Ripper is an intense slasher film that is in the same category as William Lustig's Maniac! If you love slasher films of the 1980's, and don't mind hardcore violence or mind it, but want to see a terrific slasher film thats been long forgotten, then The New York Ripper is one film that takes no prisoners. One of the most violent films of Lucio Fulci's career, and if you're familiar with Fulci, then that says something about this film.

A complete suprise to me - having seen Zombie and other Fulci films, with his stereotypical gore and inventive killings (usually at the hands of zombies of some type), Fulci moves completely away from any supernatural tone, to a downtrodden New York in modern-day America. A killer is on the loose, viciously murdering attractive young women. The difference that struck me with this particular film was immediate - the deaths are so much more realistic and cruel. The camera lingering over every explicit detail. Fulci seems to have set out to combine horror with thriller in this flick, and has done so on almost every level - the horror, however, mostly comes from the extremely realistic feel that this movie has and the downbeaten locations where everything occurs. The vicious murders seem all the more believable as a result. I'd read many reviews for this film before finally watching it (in the UK, this film has an almost legendary cult-status; the BBFC actually had the film reels police-escorted out of the country when it was originally sent to them for certification in 1982), but don't necessarily agree with the way everyone mocks the killer's duck-like voice when talking to the police; if anything, it comes across as macabre and there is a reason for it, from a psychological perspective, revealed at the end. Oh yes - the final killing of the cop's girlfriend/prostitute - is every bit as nasty and prolonged as you've heard; the razor being dragged across her open eye and through her nipple, being slashed continually and slowly to ribbons, is just plain mean! For me this is by far Fulci's cruelest, most intense piece; Recommended only for Fulci fans and those who want something much more disturbing than any mainstream slasher pic - all others stay away; otherwise this one will leave you feeling depressed for hours afterwards