The Unholy (1988) – What Happened to This Horror Movie?

Exorcist and Omen-inspired religious fare weren’t uncommon in the horror genre in the 70s and 80s. Hell, they still aren’t. But not many of them were derived of scripts written before either film ever saw the light of day. Nor do they carry the sexual deviance and shower immediately after watching feeling of a Clive Barker’s Hellraiser. Today’s film just might. Perhaps that’s why it’s so rarely spoken of. Or why it is, to this very day, difficult to acquire or even view online. This is the story of what happened to The Unholy. (The 1988 version. Not to be confused with the 2021 Jeffrey Dean Morgan film which has no affiliation.)

The story of The Unholy begins with writer Philip Yordan. Yordan, born in 1914, had been writing for so long, he once housed blacklisted writers in his basement during the McCarthy era. The script sat dormant for years before director Camilo Vila stumbled across it wasting away in Yordan’s office while the two were working on another project. Presumably because of its contents, which were extremely dark for the time period in which they were written. Having been an altar boy in the Catholic church himself, Vila was taken by the scripts religious themes. According to the director, the script originally had much more in common with The Exorcist before he made his mark on it. Which again, didn’t exist at the time of its conception but was a staple of the horror zeitgeist by the time Vila unearthed this script. Vila confessed, “I changed it. I created a myth about a demon that tempts priests during the 40 days of Lent and then, on the night of the Resurrection, does his final temptation”. 

Vila wasn’t the last person tempted to change the script (nor was he given a writing credit for it), for that honor belonged to all-around handyman and production designer Fernando Fonseca. Fonseca would take the script and flesh out the characters and details, including the fact our leading temptress had a third nipple. Which, The More You Know, is an apparent sign of witchcraft. Details. Fonseca even crafted the unique and memorable score for the film. From scripts, to soundtracks, Fernando Fonseca was a production weapon.

Once the script was finalized and on the screen, we saw an opening that featured a bumbling priest with an intoxicating, 99.9% naked woman with a supernatural essence seducing him at a church altar. In a pretty rad special FX moment letting us know what kind of ride we’re about to embark upon, the priest caves in her to carnal offerings. And is immediately rewarded with his throat being ripped out of where his neck used to be. We’re then introduced to our lead character: Roman Catholic priest Father Michael. Played by the late Ben Cross (who would ironically play a Cardinal for the Church in a similar recent movie, Robert Zappia’s Prey for the Devil). Cross played the role with a steadfast no-nonsense attitude that was so tangible, that it managed to anchor some of the film’s egregiously wild moments. His stoic responses to the insane happenings around him were almost comedic, and exactly what the film needed in its lead character surrounded by the unbelievable.

Father Michael is called in to attempt to talk a man out of jumping off a building when (in one of the best jump scares I’ve ever seen), he himself ends up falling to his certain death. Only to M Night Shyamalan/Unbreakable style-walk away from the incident without a scratch. This is a disconcerting surprise to him, but not to his  Archbishop (cast with Creepshow’s Hal Holbrook), who sends him in to replace the slayed priest. This while secretly hoping Father Michael is the chosen one who can stop the evil entity who had killed two priests before him. Alongside Archbishop Mosely is another priest with haunting white eyes, blind from his own battles with a demonic force. This character, Father Silva, is played quite convincingly by actor Trevor Howard in one of his final roles.

Here’s where the horny Hellraiser stuff kicks in. Investigating the murder of the priest he replaced, Father Michael begins to correspond with a Police Lieutenant played by none other than Ned Beatty of the Superman franchise and Deliverance. The investigation leads him to a local club where some nice folks are displaying performance art in a communal setting. And not the kind you see at your local coffee shop during open mic night. These folks appear to be erotically cutting each other’s private parts on stage like it’s some kind of goddamn magic show for Satan’s Fall Festival. It’s here that we meet the club owner, Luke, played by a scenery-chewing William Russ. Luke resembles almost an exact cross between Joaquin Phoenix’s porn shop clerk in 8MM and Kiefer Sutherland in The Lost Boys with just a pinch of the Tiger King. It’s fun stuff. Weird. But fun.

Despite experiencing some pretty freaky paranormal moments together, Father Michael and Luke are too far on opposite sides of the spiritual aisle and end up enemies. In part, because the practical Father Michael is having a Hell of a time believing that a satanic force could roam the earth using sex to tempt the holy into their own demise. At one point even Luke questions why he’s having such a hard time believing such a thing could exist when he devoted his life to its counterpart.

Finally, after a plethora of blasphemies, sex offerings, red herrings, and a whole lot of dry ice….we reach our finale. Which naturally takes place at a church altar underneath a dead body crucified to an upside down cross, split from groin to sternum. Just like Stu said in Scream. Here, after watching a guy bleed out of his face in a way that would make Art the Clown question his lunch choices, we have the final showdown between good and evil. A scene that would be the source of the majority of controversy surrounding the production of the film. 

In the final product and theatrical cut of The Unholy, it ends with an insanely intense myriad of twisted moments. Our gorgeous sex demon (played by Nicole Fortier, whose only other credit is for 1987’s Scared Stiff) reveals her true nature to us as she licks the inner thighs of a restrained Father Michael. The editing then pans back and forth quickly between the audience witnessing either Fortier or a gigantic, slimy, demon doing the aforementioned licking. And it’s traumatizing. A lot. We’re treated to a battle between Father Michael and multiple disgusting creations before being taken on a trip into Hell itself. In these moments, strobe-like shots of the depraved flash before us. Everything from random throat slashing to flesh-eating, to someone taking a sharp object to an exposed bottom appears on screen in glimpses. Read that last part back to yourselves slowly. It’s like a Faces of Death cutting room floor in there. All this before Father Michael asks God for his strength and fulfills his prophecy as the chosen one, banishing the demon and saving the day. No more cutting folks buns for you, demon. 

The controversy doesn’t come from these bold and offensive horrors that take place here but rather from the fact that this hadn’t been the original ending of The Unholy at all. In fact, it had all been recreated from scratch. With a brand new director. When Vestron Pictures picked up The Unholy for distribution they believed in the film deeply. But they were unhappy with both the ending and overall lack of horror in its original form. The director himself had even told Fangoria before the changes to his film were made, “I don’t consider this a horror film.” Vestron had other plans. 

Impressed with the work that had been done on a previous film called Waxwork, the company gathered up a roster of folks from the film and had them give The Unholy a demonic makeover. Led by of all people, Hellraiser Special FX guru, Bob Keen. Keen had worked also on the aforementioned Waxwork as a second unit director and was given the directorial position for the gore fueled Unholy re-shoots. Keen made some sort of an attempt to put a diplomatic face on the situation, saying, “The film is not that bad. It stands up by itself. The ending just needed a little polish. It’s still the original director’s and the original team’s film. I’m just doing the ending. I’ll probably get back-end credit as ‘Additional sequences directed’ and I’m happy with that. I’m here to help people out.”  The production had to ship the entire church set in pieces from Florida to Hollywood to be resurrected for the re-shoots.

Also from Waxwork, new producer Gary Bettman explained some of the moments that weren’t in the initial cut, saying, “The ending is bigger now, we expanded its scope”, and that “There’s also more action. We’ve added two other little demons, and there’s more happening with the monster. Visually it’s a fantastic creature.” 

If you don’t own the rare Vestron Productions Blu-Ray which features the original ending, you’d have to go back to Fangoria’s initial coverage of the film in Fangoria #68 to get a glimpse of the original demon design. It stood at nine and a half feet tall and featured large, drooping breasts that will remind you of a recent horror creature found in a basement (I won’t name it in case you haven’t seen it because it’s rather a big and gross surprise). It’s hard to see the problem from a still framed image, as the demon actually looks pretty cool. But the Producer didn’t feel that way, saying, “The original creature didn’t have any teeth and had very little personality”. The new demon seen in the main cut of the film would be crafted in two different pieces. One with an articulated look for close ups, and another for far away shots. Eventually, they would end up grafting the two together for the shots in between. Practical Special FX are a gift, folks. But they aren’t one that comes easy.

The crew also wanted more interaction between Father Michael and the demon. This meant Ben Cross being called back to the set for reshoots. He didn’t seem to be having the best of times when Fangoria caught up with him there, saying, “When I studied at drama school, I received a classical actor’s training. I was prepared for all sorts of things, (but) no one ever trains you to scream and shriek while you’re crucified to an altar, and the thing that’s coming toward you is a prop man lighting up a cigarette behind the camera. These things are so embarrassing and undignified that you just try to get it in one or two takes. After that, you start to analyze, and that’s not good.” To be fair, I can only imagine how awkward some of these scenes were to film. My God. 

Multiple dream sequences were also added throughout. Including the haunting trip through Hell, hoping to add to the horrors of Father Michael’s plight. And oh, did they. Despite these mass changes, there was a lot of belief in The Unholy from those involved. A belief that unfortunately wouldn’t be rewarded financially. The film,  said to have had a budget of $7 Million, would recoup less than $6.5 million on its theatrical run. You would think like so many other morally challenging horror films of its time, The Unholy would find new life on home video. But it only received a North American release on DVD packaged with seven other films from Vestron (ironically including Waxwork). Finally, in 2017 the film was released on Blu-Ray featuring the aforementioned original ending as well as several other featurettes. 

To this day, however, it doesn’t feel like The Unholy ever received its dark flowers. Especially for a film that feels so shockingly well made in so many areas. Specifically, the FX department.  For example, one scene in particular features a German Shepard that’s had its throat ripped open. Rather than go the Halloween 5 route with a stuffed animal Doberman hanging in the attic, the production actually gave the dog anesthetic and applied the prosthetic as it slept. Just for a simple shot of a dead dog. And it looked amazing. Despite how you may feel about that tactic (the dog apparently enjoyed licking the Karo syrup off himself afterwards), it’s clear a lot of care went into the production. 

To be honest, in the realm of religious horror movies, The Unholy is more frightening than many far-more-talked-about films. So, why is it that you can’t currently stream or even rent this twisted film online anywhere?  Chalk up another win for you avid physical media collectors out there. The rest of us will just have to get creative. And that, my friends, is… as far as the time of this video at least… what happened to The Unholy. And hopefully that changes soon.

A couple of the previous episodes of What Happened to This Horror Movie? can be seen below. To see more, head over to our JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!