Problem with RIO template (footer and comments)

This has been driving me mad for a couple of days now. I’ve had other templates with similar problems (actually, I think it was by the same creator), but I’ve been able to fix the problems. This one, no matter what I do, I can’t fix it. Hoping it’s simple. The template is from here.

Straight from install, the template gives footer problems (appearing between the copyright notice and the # readers online):

PHP Error Message

Warning: fopen(besucher.txt) [function.fopen]: failed to open stream: Permission denied in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/footer.php on line 86

PHP Error Message

Warning: flock() expects parameter 1 to be resource, boolean given in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/footer.php on line 88

PHP Error Message

Warning: fputs(): supplied argument is not a valid stream resource in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/footer.php on line 90

PHP Error Message

Warning: flock() expects parameter 1 to be resource, boolean given in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/footer.php on line 92

PHP Error Message

Warning: fclose(): supplied argument is not a valid stream resource in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/footer.php on line 94

PHP Error Message

Warning: file(besucher.txt) [function.file]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/footer.php on line 96

I’ve had it chmoded at 644 and 777 to edit, but it doesn’t make a difference. I’ve tried deleting a couple of symbols in the relevant lines and it took most of the errors away, except then it was telling me that there were unexpected }s, ‘s and other symbols. There is also no besucher.txt in the download which I guess could be a problem?

I’ve tried emailing the person that created the theme a couple of days ago but haven’t received a reply. The only editing that I have done to the theme is to change the background and the header picture.

I am going to change the German into English (although the comments.php just displays as an unspaced mess upon editing), but want to get the rest of the page under control first.

I was trying to find the base XV Theme, but the original site doesn’t exist anymore (plus, I do like the header on this one and don’t really know how to change it to the same as Rio).

The problem with comments is that when I click on ‘1 Kommentar’, on the far left of the screen (so not within the white text section), this appears:

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected ‘}’ in /home/USERNAME/public_html/wp-content/themes/rioreal/comments.php on line 1

I deleted the } to see if that helped, then it kept telling me that there were other unexpected symbols. I’m pretty sure that was what I’d done with the previous template that caused me trouble, but it’s not working with this one.

I’ve reinstalled the whole thing and the error doesn’t appear on the template preview, but it automatically comes up when I activate it.

Apologies for the lengthy post – is there something I can do to fix the errors in the footer?