Necrophobia (1995) User Reviews

"Sometimes life grabs you by the balls,literally."

[morrison-dylan-fan · 5/10 · 29 July 2019]

In the final days of a Dutch viewing challenge on ICM,I looked for a quick flick I could view. Picking this up during last Halloween, a look at the run time made this the perfect fit for a watch.

View on the film:

Wisely keeping to a 60 minute run-time, co-writers/co-directors Frank van Geloven & Edwin Visser go straight for short,sharp, shocks, offering eye candy for gore hounds in sticky practical special effects. Appearing to be shot on video, (giving it a nice early X-Files-style graininess) the directors surprisingly stay away from showing skin, to instead bleed Habbo Beem's rumbling synch score and a fully charged smoke machine over the gory lashings. Intriguingly opening with Mark losing his wife Colette, the writers attempt a character study of loss and depression, which disappointingly gets chainsawed down for mild gore, not nearly as horrific as the title would suggest.

Could of been better... If we had faster pacing and depth.

[DarkSpotOn · 4/10 · 4 January 2024]

I have seen the title of this movie and the cover-art and i thought it looked interesting. The comments nail it correctly, this is clearly inspired by Chainsaw Massacre, and i am not a big fan of slashers in general.

Lets we what we got here, the acting seems okay, the camera work is the old-school 80s 90s vibe, the gore is kinda tame, but the plot is wonky to say the least. The plot is this woman is scared of death, so she becomes a serial killer like Leather face, that's kinda the whole plot.

This could of been good if it was better paced, if we had character depth, if i cared about any of these people. But honestly i did not, i just cared a bit about the female villain of this movie, because she had the most depth, every other character lacks depth, and a reason to care.

I have to say that most of this movie the first half is really dull and boring, and it slowly picks up after time, but then you kinda just lost interest as you go further into the movie, at least i did. This is for the people that enjoyed classic slasher movies like Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13, Halloween.

One hour of Dutch psychological horror.

[teljilad · 8/10 · 2 October 2000]

Those with a more than average knowledge of horror cinema, will undoubtedly recognize the fact that this genre is almost non-existent in the Netherlands. Only a few movies ever saw the light, let alone full-length movies. Perhaps one hour doesn't really count as full... but hey... give this small country a break.

Necrophobia is a small gem of a Dutch psychological horror movie about a man whose wife passed away after an accident, and his confrontation with a beautiful but macabre woman after her burial.

Both collaborating directors have made this movie into a visual treat in every shot, and the music sounds really dated but adds to the sinister atmosphere. All in all, this movie is worth watching for all lovers of the genre. It certainly leaves behind movies like "De Johnsons" and "Intensive care", and can easily rival "De lift" or "Amsterdamned", even though its budget was far less.

The Nether-Necrophilia Chainsaw Massacre & Toolbox Murders

[Coventry · 9/10 · 30 April 2007]

Over here in the Dutch-speaking region (The Netherlands & Belgium), the popular belief is that we are completely incapable of making good or even half-decent horror movies. Okay, admittedly, there aren't a lot of genre movies coming out here and then still the majority of them indeed downright suck, but if you search devotedly, there honestly are a handful of competent and worthwhile titles to discover, only no one has ever heard of them. "Necrophobia" is the ideal example to state this theory. This utterly obscure and gory low-budget movie came out in 1995, but I only just found out about it now, by accident, because the directors-duo Frank Van Geloven and Edwin Visser recently released their first "big studio" production called "Sl8N8". "Necrophobia" is quite short (60min), rather bizarre, experimental and over-the-top gross, but it's an ideal feature for Dutch-speaking horror fanatics to be proud of what filmmakers in their country are capable of. The script contains some really terrific ideas, a uniquely macabre atmosphere and the make-up effects and sinister set pieces are admirably convincing. One glimpse at this film and you can immediately tell that Van Geloven & Visser are genuine horror FREAKS and they clearly watched a lifetime worth of horror movies to gather inspiration for their own debut. The plot centers on a young & happily married couple, Mark and Rebecca, living in a remote countryside farm. When Rebecca dies in a disastrous road accident, Mark loses all his will to live and spends the next following days chain-smoking and visiting his late wife's grave at the cemetery. There, a ravishing woman approaches him and even invites him to a romantic dinner at her place. Unfortunately for Mark, the woman – Colette – has serious mental issues and she's completely subjected to the will of her deranged psychiatrist. Dr. Bernhardt's "therapy" causes Colette to dig up fresh cadavers; only to mutilate them and even have carnal intercourse with them! As you can tell, the basic premise is pretty sick & demented, so if you happen to be a fan of necrophilia and explicit images of carnal molestation "Necrophobia" is the ideal film for you! The on screen murders are insanely repulsive as well, as Colette – under the influence of her therapy – uses chainsaws and all other sorts of toolbox equipment to get rid of her imaginary enemies. Mind you, the screenplay isn't just stupid and exclusively emphasizing the sickness, because there's also tension and most of the dialogs are fairly intellectual. Especially Colette's background (as in, the traumatic experience that drove her to madness) is powerful horror material and it instantly reminded me of a handful of groundbreaking and influential exploitation efforts of the early 1970's. The production values and acting performances are obviously below average, but personally this didn't bother me for one second, as the actual content is extremely fascinating. Too bad this modest gem of Nether-horror is only available in Dutch, as I'm pretty sure sick puppies all around the world would greatly enjoy "Necrophobia".