Federico Zampaglione, the so-called 'Italian Rob Zombie' and director of modern Giallo riff Tulpa: Demon of Desire returns to the well of extreme schlock with, uh, The Well. Teaming with Terrifier 2 star Lauren LaVera, Zampaglione again puts a spin on classic Italio-horror imagery and themes for the story of a young art restorer and a creepy old house with a basement full of secrets... and gross weirdos.

Travelling to a Gothic villa within a remote Italian village, Lisa (LaVera), sets to work restoring a medieval painting owned by a wealthy client and her odd family (including an unsettling daughter, played by Linda Zampaglione). But as more and more of this sinister artwork is revealed, so the ancient curse within only grows... to the extreme discomfort of the unfortunate kids chained up in the basement.

The Well is a story in two halves, neither of which is particularly well-balanced by the storytelling. In the first, Lisa's gradual descent into darkness as she reveals the painting's secrets is a moody, atmospheric haunted house film - a cameo from the late Italian grindhouse star Giovanni Lombardo Radice driving home the director's Fucli-esque aspirations. In the second instance, a honking lunatic in the basement tortures a gang of American backpackers with variously sharp and rusty implements (the gardening hook is certainly a thing to behold), before feeding them to the even worse thing lurking down the well.

There's a tonal and visual dissonance to the frequent trips to the torture basement, which is less well-shot than scenes in the villa upstairs and altogether less interesting to look at; and more reminiscent of the early noughties' torture boom than anything else. However, these sequences are also marked by some particularly grotesque practical effects - including one shot so nasty that I felt my own sphincter legitimately pulse in a pang of discomfort.

Still, no matter how clumsily the film's scenes of extreme violence may be integrated, at least they bring some relief to the generally clunky writing and performances. LaVera does well with what she is given, but her character is kept in the dark for far too long, barely giving her a chance to interact with over half of the story until the (enjoyably loopy/gloopy) final act. Lisa is a vastly different kind of character from LaVera's Terrifier 2 character, but the similarities are there in that she gives better than the film generally deserves. At least in Terrifier 2 she got to go toe-to-toe with the clown... here she just cleans a painting for a bit until the pot-bellied idiot in the basement is done chopping up backpackers.

The Well is a frustrating experience, packing its deliciously atmospheric villa full of genuinely ghastly monsters and compelling mysteries - and then doing little of note with it, aside from some irritating screeching and (admittedly generous) over-the-top gorework. The more the bigger picture is revealed, the less interesting it becomes.

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