MAUSOLEUM

There’s no two ways around it. Mausoleum is a bad movie. If it were a dog, it would be on his owner’s social media page declaring he crapped on a pillow or humped the boss’ leg when he was over for dinner.

I usually don’t like shitting on low-budget films — sometimes you work with what you got — but there’s a difference between doing your best with no funds and not having any talent or clue to what you’re doing. It comes as no surprise that the rumor around the film was that it was just a smokescreen for the Colombo crime family to launder money.

The movie (such as it is) is about a family whose first-born females eventually become possessed by a demon. This generation’s chosen one is Susan (“Don’t call me Susie”) Nomed (Nomed is Demon spelled backward. Get it? Har har). She’s a typical vision of beauty in 1983: feathered blonde hair, harsh face, huge breasts.

The demon in her often resorts to seducing ugly Ron Jeremy clones (in various periods of his career). She then dispatches them with the power of ‘still-frame’, where glowing green eyes are painted over her pupils by some post-production intern (apparently use of the contact lenses temporarily blinded the actress. Art, I was taught, demands sacrifice).

Continuity of plot and lighting are a roll of the dice. Anytime the demon comes to life, she’s lit with Suspiria inspired red and purple gels. Two feet away is her victim, lit flatly to exemplify the finest tans and beiges of only the best ‘80s TV dramas. Not that the cinematography is the film’s only cow patty. My favorite scene has to be when she physically turns into a demon in front of her psychiatrist (the green eyes, the fangs, the guttural ADR voice) and he reacts as if it’s just another common side effect of bipolar disorder.

I came to Mausoleum out of a leftover curiosity. I saw the poster as a kid and was drawn in. That god-like skeleton holding the mausoleum out, its doors slightly open to reveal some dark, terrible secret that is begging to be told. What can I say? Some doors are meant to stay shut.