Argento - Flinching with Delight

Argento’s Animal Trilogy

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Glen — No Comments ↓

I’ve been wanting to do this post for a long time – I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to finally make it happen. Dario Argento played a significant role in my early forays into the genre. I remember watching Suspiria (1977) for the first time and being so struck by it. I don’t think I’d yet seen such an aesthetic piece before – in horror or in film generally – and to be clear, I don’t mean simply an ‘aesthetically pleasing’ (read: beautiful) film, but rather a film so focused on aesthetics above all else, with all other elements in service to style, to color, light, composition, and sound, and yet still working – not just a hollow, artsy exercise in pretty shots. It was also my introduction to Italian horror: the first time I’d dealt with the characteristic, and at first, puzzling dubbing, and my introduction to the glories of Italian horror scores, specifically Goblin – it made a deep impression.

Of course, I then went down a rabbit hole on its director, particularly, his most famous works of the 70s and 80s, most of which (with one glaring exception), I’ve written about by now. Eventually, I branched out to other Italian horror directors, and subsequently, to a broader view of international horror than I’d previously taken. For young horror fan me, Suspiria had opened that door, and it will always hold a warm place in my heart, both for its own specific merits and for this role that it served me.

But I’ve always had a significant blind spot with Argento. He’d made a splash at the beginning of the seventies with a series of gialli, stylish Italian crime thrillers, all with animals in the title: The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970), Cat O’Nine Tails (1971), and Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1971), often referred to as his “animal trilogy,” though they are all narratively unconnected. While I had watched The Bird with the Crystal Plumage long ago, somehow it hadn’t made as deep an impression on me as some of his later work – it was less of a horror piece (though it certainly has elements), and the other two, I still haven’t seen. But about a year ago, I randomly put on The Bird with the Crystal Plumage and I just had an absolute blast and knew that I had to finally consider these three works – as a whole and separately.

And so that’s what we’re doing this week – revisiting the first, checking out the next two, and sharing some thoughts on each of them. I don’t know how much I will have to say about each, but I’m sure it will be fascinating to see some of the earliest work of a director who I’ve so enjoyed (of course, beware of spoilers). Also, a new documentary on Argento, Panico (2023) has just shown up on Shudder, so I’d like to watch that as well and see what context it brings.

But First, A Note On Giallo

Discussions of the borders between genres are, I think, often somewhat fruitless, but if I’m going to get into these three movies, I think it makes sense to look at how “giallo” relates to “horror.” Generally, a giallo film is more of a murder mystery thriller than horror, and as I wouldn’t be inclined to include, say most 90s Hollywood thrillers on this blog, it is fair to ask why I feel it’s different if it’s Italian. For me, it is all a matter of style. Beyond specific genre tropes, such as the black gloved killer whose identity isn’t known until the final act or the often lurid sex and violence, I think the giallo is characterized by heightened style – not just stylish, but also cinematically stylized. Weird angles, expressionistic composition, energetic editing, strong use of color, and soundscapes that both seduce and assault the senses, gialli have artistic license to aspire to more than mere realism, and in that I feel there is a kinship with horror. The story may simply be a convoluted murder mystery, but the feeling transports the viewer more wholly, and in this stylish weirdness, there be horror dragons. Also, of course, one can trace direct lines of influence from the giallo to the American slasher of the 80s; so it all connects.

And Second, A Note on Pictures

Writing from the future, having finished the post and gone looking for pictures to illustrate what I’ve described, I find it’s surprisingly hard to do justice to just how good these films look. In some later films (such as Suspiria), Argento shoots in a way that you can take any shot and put it in a frame on the wall, but I feel that’s not the case here. With these three movies, I feel the flashiness is more often in the movement of the camera and the edit, with individual shots incapable of demonstrating how very cool it all is, though I do make some descriptive efforts. So, I’ve done my best in collecting, but it should go without saying that it is worth watching the films themselves.

The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970)

As I understand it (and I am not an expert), giallo films had been being made since the early sixties (Wikipedia lists the first as Mario Bava’s The Girl who Knew Too Much in 1963), but Argento’s directorial debut was a huge international hit and really kicked off a boom time for the form. It’s easy to see inspiration in earlier works, notably Bava’s Blood and Black Lace (1964), but by all counts, Argento brought a new modern energy and panache to this horror-adjacent genre. This is a fun, ultra-stylish film – you can feel how it’s the first effort of a young artist out to make their mark. Does everything make sense? Maybe not. Are the female characters uniformly underwritten? Unfortunately, yes. Are there tons of scenes that captivate and titillate and startle and wow? Boy howdy!

The story is typical of what I’ve seen described as “m. gialli” (when the story follows a male protagonist – the tropes differ with a female lead). An outsider, in this case, an American author temporarily living in Rome and about to return to the States, happens to witness a woman being attacked through the window of an art gallery. He rushes to help, but gets stuck in a glass antechamber and can only witness her suffering as he calls and calls for police. Once they arrive, he is pulled into the investigation as both a witness and a suspect, with a shadowy figure occasionally trying to kill him before he gets too close to the truth. Throughout the film, we see the killer strike again and again, always hunting beautiful young women. Finally, the killer is revealed with a surprising (and pretty satisfying twist), leading both the protagonist and the viewer to recontextualize what was actually seen at the beginning of the film (something Argento will return to later, perhaps perfecting the idea in Profondo Rosso (1975)).

While the structure is somewhat rote for the genre, this is a film of tremendous scenes and set pieces, and whenever we get into a kill or a chase, it really pops: As jarring, mysteriously ominous music plays, a young woman lies in bed smoking in her nightgown. She turns off the light and the camera shifts to her point of view. We see the empty doorway to her bedroom as her hand moves the cigarette in and out of frame. Finally, the camera follows her gaze to the bedside table as she stubs out her smoke and then back to the open doorway, now filled with a shadowy figure. Extreme close-up of her open mouth as she screams, zooming out to see her terrified face as a gloved hand stifles her shriek of terror. A series of quick cuts – the knife slicing off her nightdress – her widened eyes – the killer in shadow, cloaked in a shiny black raincoat and hat – light shining off the blade as it trails along her belly – her hand clutching a twisted sheet – blood splashed across a pillow. It is all so propulsive, so musical in its rhythms, done with such relish and flair, and at the same time, it is scary and icky, with a sickly veneer of sexualized violence (it is strictly murder, but it feels pretty rapey).

And the film is full to bursting with such nigh hypnotic sequences. There’s another kill scene where a girl comes home to her building and we first look down on her, framed at the bottom of a triangular stairwell, before we shift to follow her ascent. Mysteriously, the lights go out on the upper floors and she has to light her way with matches that keep going out – it is tense and scary and you know this will not end well, but that does nothing to reduce the delicious suspense as she climbs to her inevitable doom. Or, late in the film, there is a great crane shot where the protagonist is racing to find his girlfriend who’s disappeared and clearly in danger, and suddenly we’re looking at him from above, but then the camera pans up to look out over the wide expanse of the whole city – she is lost in all of this space, all of these buildings and people, and then, finally, we zoom in to one window, far in the distance, where we will soon cut to discover her fate. The crane shot in Tenebre (1982) gets a lot of attention (and rightly so), but this early effort really does the trick.

I was shocked to read that, being his first film, Argento was considered inexperienced and was almost fired during filming. I don’t know what it was like on set, but the final product comes across as the confident work of an artist with a sure eye, and a strong sense of artistic purpose. Also, his father was one of the producers, so it would have been really rough if they’d actually fired him.

Finally, I love so many of the little details that live beyond the scenes of stylish murder. This movie is full of memorable characters, lines, and visual treats. The art in the gallery is fascinating – brutal, alien, and dangerous looking (another element that will resurface in Tenebre). There are so many enjoyable personalities and interactions – Solong, the pimp who has to say “so long” at the end of every sentence so as not to stutter, the effeminate German art dealer who had sold the painting that holds a key to the murderer’s identity, the crazy, cat eating artist (responsible for said painting) who exclaims that now he only paints mystical scenes because he’s “feeling mystical,” and the police lineup which has the lead investigator castigating his men that “Ursula Andres belongs with the transvestites, not the perverts!” It is consistently a deeply funny movie, and it is all of these odd little notes that lift it above simply being a cool looking thriller. It has more life than that. With its more than realistic stylization and its deep undercurrent of weird specificity, there is a pinch of something that feels like horror to me – it’s an easy film to love.

Ok, so that is The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, the only one of these that I’ve previously seen. Now for something new…

Cat O’Nine Tails (1971)

Well, that was…fine. I mean, it is a well-crafted investigative thriller, but whereas the style of “Bird” elevated it to something akin to horror, this really feels of a different genre and I wouldn’t be writing about it on this blog if not for this project. But, I don’t want to be negative about it off the bat because this movie has a lot of cool stuff – it just feels further from “horror.”

The initial premise is promising: A blind man (a former journalist who’s lost his sight and now lives with his precocious granddaughter, writing crossword puzzles) overhears a violent attack, and with the help of said granddaughter, begins investigating a series of murders, before they inevitably become targets themselves. Along the way, he ropes in a sighted reporter as they follow the nine leads (hence the title) that branch out from these killings revolving around an experimental genetic clinic.

While my initial paragraph comes off as lukewarm at best, there is great verve and craft on display here: interesting shots, tight, exciting edits (particularly some bits where we rapidly cut back and forth between times and locations before finally settling on a new context – a trick I recently appreciated Ti West using in X (2022) ), a great, groovy, occasionally jazzily discordant score from Ennio Morricone (who did the music for all three of the “Animal Trilogy”), and of course the film-making really comes to life whenever a character loses theirs. If there is a murder scene, a chase, or some other moment of violence, the movie just gets fresh energy and there are choices that surely wow.

I particularly enjoyed an early railway station murder – a man has come for a mysterious rendezvous. We shift between an objective view of him as he tries to find the one he’s meant to meet among the crowd on the platform, and the subjective perspective of the killer, clearly looking out from behind a column, back and forth and back and forth between the intended victim on one side and the oncoming train coming from the other, with one jump cut to an extreme close-up of the killer’s iris, filled with homicidal urgency. Finally, that subjective view looks back to the victim, who glances up, recognizes the one he’s come to meet and begins to walk forward before the hands of the killer come into view of this POV shot, pushing the victim onto the tracks. Quick cuts to his head slammed against the front of the train, a paparazzo catching the photo, the victim’s body spinning, pulled by the power of the locomotive, a woman bringing her hands to her head as she screams, a close up of a man’s mouth, shouting, and finally, a wide view of the gathered crowd, the murderer having disappeared into the chaos. It is really engaging work.

But, as I said, this one, for all of its flashes of high style, feels less stylized, feels more like a “normal” thriller. For me, one element that contributes to this is a shift of protagonist. Initially, it had seemed that the blind witness (played by the always enjoyable Karl Malden), would be the main lead – another “outsider” who everyone discounts due to his disability, who is enjoying getting back on the horse of chasing down a story, but you always have doubts that he should really be putting himself and his granddaughter at risk. As with many an investigative m – gialli lead, such as the writer in “Bird” or the musician in Profondo Rosso (1975), the blind crossword writer and this little girl are unlikely, but surprisingly effective detectives – a good team. But relatively early on, he goes to an active journalist (James Franciscus) with his discoveries, and they start working together, and it’s not long before the film shifts to primarily follow the new guy – young, square jawed, masculine, effective, and more than a bit obvious – and I was disappointed in the change. Malden is still around until the end, but there’s a long stretch in the middle where he seems to disappear from the story, and instead we just see an investigator investigating an investigation. While it is all still carried out well, this was to the film’s detriment.

I guess they just didn’t want to let Karl Malden enjoy this glass of post coital milk with Catherine Spaak.

By the end, we get a killer reveal that makes sense, but won’t blow any minds, and a great, intense moment of the killer’s death – and as I said, it’s all fine. I consistently enjoyed watching the story unfold, though I wouldn’t really consider this even particularly horror adjacent. My read is that Argento put a lot of creativity and effort into making a splash with “Bird”; it was a hit and he was cleared to direct more movies, and the next was very capably made – the work of a solid craftsman with a good eye and some pizzazz – but probably wouldn’t have made a name for him if it had come first. Still, it is interesting to see in terms of a larger career trajectory, and it has me curious what I’ll find in the third film.

Four Flies on Grey Velvet (1971)

Wow – what an opening! Argento starts his third movie with an electric sequence of pure style and intrigue – setting a tone, introducing character and context, and pulling the viewer into a sense of weird mystery. We cut between instruments being played – close ups on the skins of a drum as the sticks bang down in slow motion, looking down the neck and even out the inside of a guitar before a hand starts to strum – and one of the men playing them, the drummer, Roberto, as he goes about his life, more and more aware that he’s being followed by a mysterious, dark figure. As he plays, Roberto is bedeviled by a small flying insect – in his face, his hair, his eyes, flitting around his head – he tries to get it when it settles on one of the drums, but too late. Sometimes the music of the band dominates the soundscape and sometimes we cut to near silence – an isolated shot of a beating heart with a heartbeat, once with the title card and once without, and then back to Roberto being tailed by the dark figure. Finally, the insect settles on the bottom cymbal and you can see Roberto, eager, hoping it won’t move for a few seconds, and then it’s time: the cymbals crash, the fly is dead. Roberto has a look of relief and satisfaction.

By the end of this scene (about 4 minutes long), I was charged – hooked and excited to see where this was going to go – and immediately we’re off to the races as one night after a recording session, when Roberto is walking home alone, he realizes the man is watching from the shadows and decides to follow and confront him. This becomes a chase through arched piazzas, full of movement and light and shadows and bold camera placements, striking angles, and a play of framing and focus. Finally, he follows the man into an old, abandoned, dilapidated theatre and catches his arm. The man pulls a switchblade, there’s a struggle, and Roberto seems to accidentally stab his stalker, who falls into the orchestra pit as floodlights fill the room and another figure in a creepy, plastic baby doll mask photographs Roberto in what looks like an act of murder. And then the lights are off, the figure is gone and Roberto is on his own to deal with this apparent crime which has so clearly and mysteriously been staged (in a theatre no less).

Great set up – so far, I love everything about the movie – suspenseful, intriguing, and so very over-the-top cool. But then, I’m sorry to say it doesn’t last. On Wikipedia, I read a quote from a contemporary review of “Four Flies” from Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times, that the film works “when the camera is moving and no one is talking,” and I think he nailed it. Argento pulls off some spectacular scenes here, and the passion for a great shot and a great edit is clear, but the story never really cohered for me, and furthermore (as this is a horror blog), though it sets up some atmosphere early on, and there are a couple of moments that feel like horror, most of the investigatory angle of the movie apparently isn’t interested in maintaining that vibe. What’s more, the investigation felt frustrating as we are fed red herring after red herring, and in the end, the explanation of what is going on feels like it comes completely out of left field, while leaving big questions unresolved. Now, I don’t need to understand everything, but for me, it just didn’t feel like it worked. And then the final moments are just so wildly abrupt that I couldn’t help but laugh. I mean, it was kind of fun, but I wasn’t sure if it was the tone this story wanted to end on.

So, I think this one might mainly be recommended for completionists – if you really want to track Argento’s development as a director, you will find a great deal to enjoy, but if you are just casually looking for a satisfying movie, you may come away disappointed.

That said, there are pieces in here that I certainly appreciated, and even some that I loved. As is often the case, there was enjoyable specificity of character that brought a sense of life to it all, raising the film above its mystery procedural roots. For example, as he is being tormented by the unknown blackmailer who doesn’t even ask for anything, but just seems to be trying to torment him, Roberto turns for help to his friend, “God” (short for Godfrey), a big scruffy hippy type who lives in a shack next to a polluted stream, wears rags, and eats raw fish. God brings onto the case his associate, “The Professor,” a well-spoken tramp with a bible verse for every occasion, and Arrosio, a flamingly gay private detective on an 83 case losing streak who is sure that this will be the one he finally solves. It is odd to say the least. But also oddly lovable. Perhaps they kill the tone, but these roles bring something fresh and surprising to the film – and while Arrosio’s gayness reads as caricature from a contemporary perspective, he isn’t fobbed off as a joke – he does effectively figure out the mystery (though he doesn’t live long enough to reveal that information), so that’s something for representation I guess (beyond that, it is interesting to note how there are explicitly queer characters in almost all of Argento’s early films – I read somewhere that he was trying to show a more modern world – the one that he inhabited – and that this was an integral element of that).

And then there are a couple scenes that would shine in any horror movie, in which Argento allows himself to depart from straight realism and approach something more surreal, more expressive. The best example here features a character who has figured out what is happening and arranges to meet the killer in a crowded park on a sunny afternoon. She sits on a bench as children play and scream in an adjacent playground, young lovers kiss among the trees, cheerful music blares from loudspeakers, and everywhere there is bustling life and safety. Then the sound cuts out for a moment and the music is gone. We hear the children, but don’t see them. Suddenly, she is all alone – the park seems deserted. She is no longer safe. She gets up and starts for the exit, but in the next shot, it is abruptly night time and she knows she’s being followed by someone unseen.

Over the course of about 90 seconds, she seems to have stumbled from the world of the living, surrounded by the hubbub and security of the crowd, of day, into an underworld of shadow and threat. She runs through the paths of the park, the looming trees on either side become endless, winding corridors and it feels like a knife wielding maniac could leap out at any moment. She runs round a corner, and now she’s no longer among trees, but flanked on either side by stone walls, cobwebs connecting them that she must claw through. The way grows more and more narrow as, more and more desperate with fear, she claws herself forward. We alternate between her panting and grunting as she lurches towards freedom and life, and a silent POV shot of the killer trailing her slowly but surely. Finally, he hear her death screams and see her hand scratching down a wall as she meets her end. It is an absolute nightmare – and it doesn’t really make a lick of sense, but I think that’s part of why it works so well. The director is free to follow the star of the moment, unburdened by narrative demands. It’s when the story returns to the narrative that it falters.

So yeah, I’m happy I watched it. There are surely details worth seeing. But I can’t say it’s my favorite thing by Argento.

Summing Up

Ok, so I have now watched the “Animal Trilogy” and first off, I think it’s obvious why the only one I’d seen before was the first – The Bird with the Crystal Plumage really stands out among the three as special – in craft, in creativity, in style, and in its connection to the horror genre. The next two titles were made the following year and perhaps it was just too much too soon, but through them both, Argento’s talent and passion are still evident, and if one is interested in his work, I think it’s worth seeking them out. As I understand, after this, he turned to TV for a little while and also made a period comedy, The Five Days (1973) before returning to giallo (and horror) with what some consider his best film, Profondo Rosso (1975) (AKA Deep Red) (one of these days, I will finally write about it as well). While Profondo Rosso is obviously superior to these first three (a subjective opinion, but one I expect many would share), I think one can also see the seeds of creative choices he would make there in these “Animal” films. I’m happy to have finally seen them and I’m curious to know more.

So, that said, I have one more assignment for myself this week. As I wrote at the beginning, a documentary on Argento’s oeuvre has just dropped on Shudder, so before I sign off, I’m going to give it a watch and report back on anything of interest, particularly that which pertains to these first three films…

Dario Argento – Panico (2023)

Well, I’m glad I watched that, but I’m not sure how much to go into. It is a very personal piece of work – most of the interviews are with family or long-time collaborators who feel like family – his ex-wife, some of his daughters, his sister, Claudio Simonetti (of Goblin), and Michele Soavi, Lamberto Bava, and Luigi Cozzi (all three of whom worked under Argento as an assistant, and also directed films that he produced), with just three directors, Guillermo del Toro, Gaspar Noé, and Nicolas Winding Refn, speaking about how they were influenced by Argento’s work (an interesting collection – they are three strikingly different directors, though a possible through line between them is how visual they all are).

It is a very intimate portrait, as interested in his life as a father, a lover, a brother, or a son, as it is in his life as a film maker, but one quality that comes across loud and clear is the extent to which the work was always treated as art. And I don’t mean that in a pretentious way – he was not (he’s still alive, so I should be using a different tense, but generally I’m speaking of the early career, namely the Animal Trilogy) claiming to make some “elevated work,” ashamed to be associated with the genre in which he found a home. Rather, he was making entertaining thrillers or horror films, but respecting them as art and therefore all the more demanding of himself and his team in their execution. This is obvious in the technical prowess on display (apparently, on “Bird” the reason he was almost fired was that one of the producers thought he was doing too much weird stuff with the camera – I think time has proved that guy wrong), but it was no less true in the writing, the storytelling, the choice of subject matter. Over the course of his career, he has returned time and time again to dark themes and brutality out of a need to express something specific of himself on celluloid (in, again, an entertaining thriller, as opposed to some kind of heavy drama). And sometimes, very private elements make their way onto the screen, such as Trauma (1993) in which his daughter, Asia Argento plays a character suffering from anorexia, who was directly based on Asia’s half-sister. Or in the case of our three films today, apparently Four Flies on Grey Velvet at least in part prompted the dissolution of his first marriage as his wife at the time was, shall we say, nonplussed to see the degree to which the protagonist and his wife were so directly based on Dario and herself (if you watch the movie, you’ll understand why she might find that objectionable).

It’s easy to say, “Oh Argento – he’s so stylish and visual and makes things that look cool,” but watching Panico, he really comes across as a cinematic artist who is doing everything in his power to dig deep and make work that is significant, meaningful, personal, powerful – but in his case, that is work where a killer’s hands get lacerated as he falls down an elevator shaft, a woman is decapitated in a slow motion car accident, art objects can be deadly, and black gloved hands are always capable of reaching out of the shadows, blade in hand. We respect work that makes us cry – we can recognize the artistic value in drama – why not work that makes us tremble? Why should sadness be held above terror – or as Argento would have it in one interview, “panic”? Now, it is obvious that Argento is not alone in this, but I think that so often, genre is still undervalued and standout work from horror or thrillers, or even lighter fare like romantic comedies is overlooked (horror can ask so much of a performer and comedy is really hard). This documentary merely underlines the extent to which this genre director deserves to be considered through the lens of artistic merit.

I must admit that the second two films, while interesting to me as a completionist, and while they included many great elements, didn’t exactly blow me away (at least not like “Bird” or much of his stellar run from Profundo Rosso (1975) to Opera (1987). But after watching something of the life behind the scenes, perhaps I appreciate them a bit more. They are straightforward mystery thrillers, but they were made with a real drive to innovation, to expression, to doing something bigger, better, more. And the experience of making these surely contributed to building the foundation that made his best work possible.

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And so there we have the “Animal Trilogy.” It’s been gratifying to explore these three. All have something to recommend them, and as an early glimpse of a director I’ve long enjoyed and respected, it has been illuminating. How good it is that I finally took up this particular homework assignment and checked them out. Thanks for coming along. If you’re interested in watching any or all of them, as of the time of writing, I found The Bird with the Crystal Plumage on Shudder, Cat O’Nine Tails on Tubi, and Four Flies on Grey Velvet on Plex.

Catching Up With Shudder – International Voices

Posted on February 6, 2023 by Glen — No Comments ↓

As is true of many people, I carry more subscriptions than are probably necessary. Summing it all up, it doesn’t break the bank and I don’t exactly feel like I’m wasting my money, but how on earth could I ever watch all of the stuff on all of these different services? But each has something I want and that keeps me paying every month. One that I never regret is my subscription to Shudder, a streamer specializing in Horror (and thrillers – there’s a great collection of Gialli). I know that there are other ways to have access to a great amount of content (Tubi is free with commercials, for example), but I just feel some kind of loyalty to this one – it feels smaller; it doesn’t have an endless selection, and sometimes they can’t afford the biggest films, but it is curated by people rather than algorithms and I like that personal touch. And they do release a lot of exclusive films – some of which they produce and some of which they simply distribute.

But as I’ve often written, I have trouble keeping up with new stuff, so this week, as I’m a teacher and it’s winter holiday where I live (so I have some extra time), I’d like to catch up on some Shudder originals from last year, particularly some international releases and/or films bringing a different cultural perspective. Sometimes I see fans complain about how Hollywood has run out of ideas and is just endlessly milking properties that should have been allowed to die gracefully (but, to be fair, this is Horror – no one dies gracefully), but in recent years, streaming has really opened up the international market, and I feel that there are so many fresh voices worth exploring. So that’s the plan. Let’s see how much I can get through by the end of the week.

These will be shorter reviews – just giving some first impressions – and I’ll try to keep these spoiler free…

Saloum (2022) (Senegal)

A Senegalese genre mash-up, written and directed by Jean Luc Herbulot from Congo, this is a wild, entertaining ride, steeped in cultural references and recent history that I respectively had no previous connection to and was woefully ignorant of. Set in 2003, directly after a coup in Guinea-Bissau, the movie blends elements of a Dirty Dozen-esque Western, a slick Guy Ritchie crime flick, and African Folk Horror, while also digging into very real and raw emotional territory growing out the hellish conditions of child soldiers, the constant specter of colonialism, and cycles of abuse – personal, economic, sexual, and political. But for all of the weight of those themes, it is chiefly just a lot of fun.

We follow a trio of legendary mercenaries on an adventure as they escort a Mexican cartel member out of the coup, along with a great deal of stolen gold. After crash landing in the remote region of Sine-Saloum (in Senegal), they find their way to a kind of liminal outpost where apparently good works are done and volunteers live in communal harmony, but in fact, dark secrets run deep, the sand is soaked with blood, personal ghosts await vengeance, and literal spirits haunt the blasted land.

I enjoyed all of the characters and loved how varied they were allowed to be. Our trio of outlaws seem initially so hard, so dangerous – they can easily be read as militaristic thugs. But as we get to know them, they are so worldly and cultured. They speak many languages (including sign, which will become important). They may be “very bad men” (and they probably are) but they may also be “mythic heroes.” They are even surprisingly well-versed in spiritual matters, with one of them being some kind of cleric who can help navigate the magical threat they’ll face. Though they begin as a blend of archetypes, we come to know them as quite specific and anything but typical.

I will say that the Western and Crime elements landed better for me than the Horror. When something supernatural does turn up, even though there’s plenty of threat and blood and death, it somehow doesn’t fully tap into a horror vibe. However, the supernatural storyline is still fascinating, especially as it’s so tied to what I assume must be local folk beliefs, superstitions, and stories. The fact that I don’t know anything about this folklore made it all feel so rich and intriguing – and I appreciate that the film doesn’t seem to feel the need to really slow down and make sure that we’ve all got it all – it flies by at a clip and if you don’t immediately get something, I feel Herbulot assumes you’ve caught enough to work with, and keeps the story moving.

And beyond the action, it is also quite emotional. Balancing real world horrors and genre thrills, characters are given room to breathe and feel and change, and their personal histories come to bear in sometimes surprising, even tragic ways. This was a fascinating, high-paced, rewarding watch and while the “scary” parts weren’t very scary, the way it grounds the characters’ experiences in realistic trauma carries weight and brings the horror in a different way.

The Sadness (2021) (Taiwan)

A Taiwanese production with a Canadian director (who has lived there since 2008), The Sadness is gory, disturbing, intense, stressful, triggering, mean-spirited, and a pretty fun ride if you’re up for that sort of thing. Rob Jabbaz’s feature debut, filmed during the early days of the Covid pandemic (apparently Taiwan did pretty well at the beginning (8 deaths in 2020), so filming was actually possible), concerns a viral outbreak which transforms ‘normal’ people into vicious, sex-crazed sadists. I’d thought it was going to be a zombie movie, but is actually more akin to contagion films like Romero’s The Crazies (1973). Ostensibly, we follow a young couple as they try to find each other across a Taipei transformed in a matter of hours into a blood-soaked hell-scape filled with roaming bands of humans at their most monstrous. But I think that structure largely exists to allow Jabbaz to create scene after scene of mostly unrelated violence and depravity. But what violence and depravity! I spent probably 65% of this movie constantly cringing and recoiling at its sudden acts of extreme brutality.

It’s a really tense watch, but for all that it puts on display some truly awful stuff, it can also be a blast. It is a thrilling rollercoaster that raised my heartrate and put me on edge for the majority of its run time. And the practical effects work (from IF SFX Art Maker) is really extraordinary: fleshily realistic, but operatically explosive, they paint Taipei red by the end of the film. Faces are fried with hot oil and pulled apart, arterial geysers shoot up from torn necks, noses are bitten off, heads blow up, limbs are snapped, eyes are gouged, fingers are cleaved, and things are done which I’m not even going to put into words – it’s a lot, and it is all pulled off so well – disgusting, scary, and wild – and so creatively conceived of and masterfully executed.

At this point, I don’t know how much I need to watch a film about a viral pandemic – it can be a bit tiring. But this is such a high octane experience that it balances the weight of its metaphor, which is basically the classic zombie movie observation that disasters bring out the worst in us and that it takes so little for the thin veneer of society to be stripped away as we turn on each other. This is tackled in two ways: how the infected are portrayed and how we see everyone else respond. Of course, the infected are terrible, but the way they are terrible feels kind of novel.

These are not mindless zombies or rage filled marauders (ala 28 Days Later). They are fully cognizant of what they are doing and who they are – but the virus has amplified any of their inherent cruelty and crossed wires in their brains such that they derive overwhelming sexual pleasure from causing harm (and the wires cross the other way too, so be warned that there’s sexual violence as well). They are crazy and dangerous, but they have the ability to be calculating; and they are as intelligent as they’d been before infection – it makes for a really unsettling situation – almost like a mass possession, ‘evil’ spreading through the population.

But it’s not only the infected. Of course, in classic fashion, we see healthy characters take immediate steps to protect themselves to the detriment of those around them. Doors are closed in people’s faces as they run from assailants, someone who could help a woman being assaulted, hides just feet away and does nothing, too concerned with his own safety, those who have yet to be exposed to a viral load lash out at each other. Typical for a genre like this, the film holds a dim view of humanity, but hey, after the last few years, it’s kinda hard not to.

Dark Glasses (2022) (Italy)

When I heard that Dario Argento had a new film coming out, his first since Dracula 3D (2012) (about which, the less said, the better), I was, let’s say, relieved. I can’t go so far as to say ‘excited’ as I didn’t want to get my hopes up – it had been a while since he’d made a film I had particularly liked, let alone loved as I did his work in the 70s and 80s. But it was a relief that no matter what this new film was, Dracula now wouldn’t be his swan song. Well, Shudder picked up his latest and released it back in October, so now I’ve finally checked it out and I can say…it is a film.

Honestly, I generally avoid negativity here, because really, what’s the point? (and the internet is so full of it) I mostly just want to focus on work that interests me, and not to criticize films that fall short, but I can’t find very much to praise in this case – which is depressing. It’s not terrible by any means. I’m not offended by it on some deep artistic level. It isn’t a total failure. But it also isn’t particularly noteworthy either – I think if Argento’s name weren’t attached, it would come and go, maybe end up on some streamer without any fanfare, and horror bloggers such as myself would probably never end up writing about it.

Essentially, it is a straightforward thriller: a serial killer has been targeting prostitutes in Rome. One such sex worker, Diana, is attacked, but survives, though in escaping her assailant, she has a car accident and loses her sight. Then, having befriended a young boy who was orphaned in the crash, the two of them are hunted by the tenacious killer until the final showdown and identity reveal. There are chase scenes and bloody murders (the gore seems to be practically executed and is quite well done), periodic jump scares (one effective bit with water snakes), and lots of screaming too loudly when one should be silently hiding. It’s…fine.

But where it is disappointing is that, though it is capably filmed, there’s no flash, and also little substance. It’s impossible not to compare this to Argento’s earlier work and imagine what a younger artist would have done with it. Blindness might be an artistic theme, a visual metaphor – it might resonate with some psychological trait of the killer or it might make visible something about the protagonist. Here, Diana simply can’t see and bumps into things and falls down – it’s a complication, but it doesn’t bear thematic fruit, and her experience doesn’t seem to especially change her. Similarly, the blindness isn’t used to create any particularly suspenseful set pieces, playing with who can watch and who is seen. As a sex worker who makes a living out of exploiting her visual appearance and interacting with clients in a sensory fashion, it feels like there is a lot of untapped potential here – playing with objectification, with being a subject and the power, and even violence, inherent in looking (ala Opera).

Finally, and crucially, there just not much style on display. Young Argento could be stylish to a fault, sometimes putting the narrative in service of creating an enrapturing look and a feel. In Dark Glasses, the camera never finds that perfect angle, the editing never makes the heart catch. The score is fine, but it is never paired with the imagery to make something indelible. At the end of the day, all of this criticism feels a bit unfair. This is its own film and Argento doesn’t owe me anything. As artists age, they shouldn’t feel behooved to constantly recreate the work of their youth. But when an artist has done such spectacular work early in their career, it’s hard not to compare.

Speak No Evil (2022) (Denmark)

I was actually hesitant to pull the trigger on this one. It made a splash when it came out last year (which meant that I saw loads of people praising it on social media and probably more complaining about it – that’s the internet for you), and my impression was that it would be really uncomfortable and heavy. And, to be fair, Christian Tafdrup’s film is indeed uncomfortable – a kind of social horror rooted in the deep and familiar awkwardness of feeling trapped in an interaction wherein you have to do things you don’t want to or risk coming off as some kind of rude jerk, but for all of that discomfort (and some pretty unpleasant places it goes once it turns to full-on horror), I wasn’t weighed down by it. Rather, I was mostly elated by just how very good it was.

In short, a Danish family (Bjørn and Louise, and their daughter Agnes), while on holiday in Italy, hit it off with Dutch family (Patrick and Karen, and their son Abel), who invite them to visit for a long weekend. Though they’d had such a good time together before, as soon as they arrive, the Danish family is immediately made to feel uncomfortable at every turn. Louise is a vegetarian, but Patrick insists she try the wild boar he’s prepared. The Dutch parents are much rougher with their son than Bjørn and Louise would ever be. When “invited” out to a restaurant (where again, they only order meat), Bjørn and Louise are first put off by Patrick and Karen grinding on the dance floor, before then being surprised that they are expected to cover the full cost of the rather expensive meal.

Time after time, Patrick and Karen do things (sometimes small irritations and sometimes quite significant violations of privacy) that seem to push Bjørn and Louise into accepting uncomfortable situations. But at the same time, it often just feels like a case of cultural or family difference. I don’t know enough about social mores in Holland and Denmark, but I can assume there are some different assumptions about “appropriate” behavior when it comes to issues of personal space, money, directness, private life, and risk aversion, among other things. And beyond national habits, each family can simply be different.

Time after time, Bjørn and Louise almost take their daughter and go, but one thing or another holds them back until they find themselves in the embarrassing position of having insulted their hosts, who are always quite open and charming, and when Bjørn and Louise try to explain what upset them, it always sounds unreasonable (even though while watching these things take place, red flags go off for the viewer non-stop). Tafdrup crafts an atmosphere of almost unbearable tension and dread and maintains it for over an hour (of a film that’s just a bit over 1 ½ hours long) before anything happens that feels like a horror movie per se. Of course though, when the penny finally drops, it’s clear that everything we’ve seen has been deliberate. Also, while for that first hour, nothing clues in the Danish family to the fact that this other couple is anything worse than unpleasantly inappropriate, this is a horror film from start to finish. The work of the camera and especially the soundtrack is just so doom-laden that it couldn’t be anything else.

Now, I will say that once some revelations were made, while still generally well handled, I wasn’t quite as thrilled with the final act. I think that I had just been so enjoying the ominous awkwardness, and had been so keyed-up, wanting the Danish couple to just get the hell out of there, that once the masks came off, the film lost some sparkle. It still follows through on the promise of its threats, but I wasn’t quite as spellbound as I had been. But never mind the destination – the journey was one of the best I’ve gone on in a good while. And while the filmmaking is strong, so much of this comes down to the performances. A Horror of Manners, this is an actor’s piece and everyone is spectacular. I particularly enjoyed Morten Burian (who plays Bjørn) – seduced by this open, wild couple who are so unlike him and his wife, stifled by the burden of polite behavior, he is finally pushed into a corner where his moral sense is challenged and he needs to break through his own socialization to try to do the right thing. It’s an emotional tightrope. And that’s before he discovers anything at all scary. I really liked this one.

Slash/Back (2022) (Canadian Inuit)

Her feature debut, Nyla Innuksuk’s teen horror/sci-fi adventure is a unique and worthy effort even if it isn’t totally successful as a genre piece. Wearing its influences on its sleeve (early on, one character recounts the whole story of John Carpenter’s The Thing to her friends), the film charms more for how it spotlights an underrepresented population than for the novelty of its plot.

In short, a small group of teen Inuit girls in the tiny hamlet of Pangnirtung (about 30 miles south of the Arctic Circle, pop. approx. 1,500) discover and alone fend off an invasion of weird, shape shifting, body wearing, identity stealing aliens, saving their home town, and by extension, the planet. Along the way, they navigate their own interpersonal teenage conflicts (boys and school and parents who just don’t understand) and their own relationships to their home and culture. Innuksuk filmed on location in “Pang” (as the protagonists call it) and cast the film almost entirely with local, indigenous inhabitants, few if any of whom had worked before as actors.

Thus, there is an amateur quality to the performances; but in a way, that’s actually a strength of the film. I can’t say that the young leads manage particularly realistic performances (that’s hard), but the extent to which their own personalities shine through is honestly lovely. There is a precocious, brash quality to their portrayals which is essential to the project. Past the acting, much of the film is gorgeous, the local landscape offering overwhelming vistas to explore, and Innuksuk makes good use of them, while also digging into aspects of local small town life. The film is full of specific local details and character. And the periodic inclusion of the Inuk throat singing of Tanya Tagaq (who, like Innuksuk, is also from the region) adds such a cool, characteristic drive to it all. As for the scary horror/sci-fi alien invasion movie, it’s…fine. There’s some cool creature design and the CGI and practical effects do a solid job while obviously working within a budget, but the film never quite kicks into gear when it comes to the action or tension. Still, I think it’s so important that this is a genre piece. While it may not be amazing Sci-Fi or Horror, the sci-fi and horror give Innuksuk a rich space in which to tell a significant, meaningful story.

At its heart, we have 4 young girls torn between cultures. They have grown up in this hamlet and there is a degree of local, cultural pride (for some more than others), but for the rest, the world beyond holds so much more allure and they can’t wait to escape, to get out of this little village they view as poor or embarrassing, to go to some big city (one girl dreams of Winnipeg). In responding to this invasion, which so directly threatens their homes, families, and environment, they all tap into the cultural knowledge that has been instilled in them – the traditional tools of hunting and trapping their parents have passed on, and as they triumph over this colonizing presence, they repair their relationship to where they are from. It’s hard not to cheer when they rip what have come to be decorative, traditional gear off the walls, apply what I read as a kind of war paint (plus, one girl puts on a jacket with the slogan, “No Justice on Stolen Land” – which crystalizes the metaphor for anyone who hadn’t gotten it yet) and march off to hunt down the invading force, pushed on by the rallying cry of, “you don’t fuck with the girls from Pang!” I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to tearing up.

The aliens are kinda creepy and have a cool design – tendrils writhing beneath loosely worn, stolen flesh, but the scares never really come. However, I really think that’s ok. This ‘kids on bikes’ movie, full of real people who are participating in telling a story of their land, their civilization, their struggles, all through the lens of this monster movie is really stirring in its own right. It might not be much of a “horror movie,” but it is a valuable film, while also being just a fun Kids vs Monsters flick. I’m glad it has a chance to be seen (at least by the pretty niche audience of Shudder viewers).

—

And so there we have a little international sampling of Shudder in 2022. There was a good deal more, but I only have so many hours to work with here. Someday, I’ll catch up on the rest. I will say that it’s refreshing to take in such a wide range of work in one week. I generally don’t know enough about these countries to judge how accurately Senegalese, Taiwanese, Italian, Danish, Dutch, or Inuit cultural concerns have been presented, but I feel it’s been so worth taking the time to at least get a taste.

Suspiria: Cinematic Pleasure, Candy Colored Joy

Posted on September 28, 2022 by Glen — No Comments ↓

Following last week’s look at Argento’s output in the eighties, I felt like staying on this train and finally tackling what might be considered his opus, Suspiria (of course, others will argue the point, but that’s what I suppose the internet is for). Regardless of whether or not it’s his best work (and it very well may be), it is easily his most iconic and recognizable. It was the first of his films that I saw and it surely made an impression (I also expect it was my first Italian horror film way back when, and thus my first exposure to some of the typical traits thereof, such as the characteristic dubbing).

And yet, for all that it holds a place of honor among fans and critics, I think there is sometimes a kind of snooty gatekeeping reaction against it. “Oh sure, you like Suspiria. But everyone’s seen that; you can’t really call yourself a serious horror fan until you can comment incisively on Jenifer (an Argento-directed episode of the anthology TV show, Masters of Horror) and the collected works of Umberto Lenzi, Bruno Mattei, and Joe D’Amato.” Additionally, given the divisive nature of its 2018 remake (which I really love and have written about here), I think many fans of Guadagnino’s film (criticized by some for how it differs from the original), have thus taken a defensive posture against the original, or at least, have cooled on it. While I understand that emotional response, I’d encourage anyone in that camp to revisit Argento’s film. Having re-watched it a couple of times recently for this post, I can attest that it holds up as a very special movie and is worth watching with fresh eyes. So, let’s get into it…

Suspiria (1977)

I may not watch it so often, but every time I do, I get immediately excited. The opening scene is just such a thrill (in which not much really happens, but the way it doesn’t happen is so cinematic and magical). Our main character, Suzy, arrives at an airport in Germany late at night, and it is immediately the most gorgeously shot airport I’ve ever seen (not a gorgeous airport mind you, but gorgeously shot). As she walks towards the exit, every time the automatic doors open, a storm rages outside and the musical theme creeps in, only to cut out the second the doors have closed.

It’s as if she’s in this liminal space of travel, still between worlds, still protected within its walls, but outdoors, a gale of menacing supernatural force howls. Finally outside, buffeted by the wind and the rain, she eventually succeeds at hailing a taxi and has a hilarious interaction with the driver, familiar to anyone who’s spent much time abroad – she says the street she’s going to multiple times and he just shrugs, not understanding and not caring; finally she shows him the address and he goes “Ah, Escherstraße,” pronouncing it, to my ears, identically to how she had been saying it, and starts to drive. Now moving, her face is bathed in ever changing colored lights. It’s not realistic – I don’t think she would be lit this way by actual florescent signs and streetlights, but it feels real while it is happening and this disorienting chromatic play beautifully situates her as a small, wet, fragile being alone in a very foreign, incomprehensible, and unforgiving land.

When the taxi pulls up at her destination (the dance academy at which she has come to study), the deep red and gold building looms like a monster above her and the rain comes down in buckets, highlighted by an improbably bright light, just out of view. She sees a girl shouting in the doorway and running off into the night, but is denied entry herself by the voice on the intercom and has to return to the impatient driver to be taken to a hotel for the night.

In the car, she catches a glimpse of that girl, terrified, running through the woods from some unknown threat. We then follow that girl into a shockingly gorgeous art deco interior where she will shortly be murdered in the next scene (and that murder will of course be a visual spectacle – gory, scary, and stunningly composed, every rich streak of blood in its place).

I’m not going to describe every frame of the movie, though almost every shot could be framed, so consciously and artfully has it been crafted, but I wanted to give some sense of how strong it starts, of its atmosphere of overwhelming audio-visual elation.

Sometimes Suspiria is dismissed as style over substance, as that colorful movie, as an exercise in empty visual excess, but at the end of the day, what is the medium of cinema? It’s just light, brighter or darker, in different hues, accompanied by sound; thus, I think it short sighted to discount work which gives so much attention, so much care to exactly those elements, lovingly, joyfully, successfully crafting a sensory experience unlike any other (which still delivers other cinematic value as well) simply because the story is simple.

Suspiria is basically a fairy tale. A young girl (Suzy Bannion) goes to a mysterious dance academy in the middle of a dark forest. Everyone there is strange and standoffish, and the teachers are demanding. Struck by a light reflecting off a crystal in the hallway, Suzy falls sick and is forced to board at the school against her will while she recovers. Her diet is controlled and it’s implied that the wine is drugged or enchanted. There are odd disappearances and deaths; those who displease the instructors meet bad ends. Suzy feels compelled to investigate and comes to learn that they are a coven of witches, led by the often invisible old crone who is perhaps leeching some of the young students of life. Having killed the witch and broken her power, Suzy escapes the school as it burns, the other witches screaming within. Technically, these are spoilers, but in a fairy tale like this, I really don’t think it matters.

There are some absurdities along the way and things that just don’t make sense (it seems obligatory to ask why any dance academy, even one run by evil witches would keep a room filled with razor wire – also, in one scene the pianist who provides music for classes seems to be playing an orchestra – we see him at the piano, but we hear a string section and perhaps some woodwinds until he stops playing), but the simple story actually plays out with consistency, and serves as a structure to hold glorious images and spectacular sequences of dread, suspense, and optic extremity.

And the quality of those images really cannot be oversold. Leaning hard into the fairy tale of it all, Argento instructed the cinematographer, Luciano Tovoli, to base the colors of the film on those of Disney’s Snow White, and utilized the same Technicolor film printing process that had been used on The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind, thought outdated at that time (after printing Suspiria, the last Technicolor equipment in Italy was dismantled). Furthermore, Tivoli mostly eschewed typical colored gels, instead creating screens of colorful velvets and tissue paper which he used to paint the light, intending a greater tactile effect, which I feel he achieved. For more on Tivoli, I recommend this fascinating exploration of his work.

From moment to moment, especially exploring the luscious interiors of the academy, or the building where Pat is killed, my breath catches in my throat. There is really is something to the deeply saturated colors; this is as true of the crushed velvet on the walls as it is of the light coming through the stained glass in the ceiling, or of the bright red, paint-like blood trailing down a victim’s body. The whole film is a sensory delicacy, a delight.

And light and color are not the only sensory elements of significance. In this, their second collaboration with Argento, Goblin crafted an inimitable, dominating score. It features the synth-prog groove one would expect of them, but is also just really aggressive – sometimes discordant, sometimes jarring. Thus, it brings certain scenes to life, adding a sense of the arcane even to moments which lack other markers of danger – such as when Suzy speaks with two psychiatrists about witches (like you do) in a bright, modern, sunlit courtyard. Between the music and the camera’s ever shifting position, Suspiria never lets you forget you’re watching a horror film, even while listening to some doctors whose specialty seems to be expository dialogue.

But regarding that exposition (probably one of the least gripping aspects of the film), I do appreciate something about the lore. Inspired by a prose poem by Thomas De Quincey, describing an opium dream about three ‘mothers of sorrow,’ matching the three fates, or the three graces, the screenplay by Argento and his partner, Daria Nicolodi posits witches as powerful, menacing, and malicious, but doesn’t bring any typical Christian mythology into it. Satan’s never mentioned, nor is sin. I love when we can have supernatural threats that linger just beyond our understanding without having to buy into something that feels like an infomercial for the church. It is nice not to be plagued by religiosity in an occult horror film, but beyond that, I think it’s just more interesting, more evocative. This world has its own mythos and we catch only the smallest glimpse of it, letting it loom that much larger in the shadows. This will be satisfyingly expanded on in Inferno.

Even when it feels obvious that story beats have been crafted primarily to set up the next visual payoff, that payoff never disappoints, such as when the maggots falling from the ceiling (thanks to meat kept in the attic, which has spoiled, presumably due to its proximity to evil witches and not because it was being stored, unrefrigerated, in an attic) results in all the students and teachers having to sleep in a large dance studio, the boys, girls, and teachers divided by white sheets. The lights are turned off and suddenly, all of the screens are backlit in red and I go, “oooh, cool!” Behind Suzy and her new friend Sara, ghostly silhouettes flit across the screen, until one particularly decrepit figure beds down exactly behind them and starts to snore in a gasping, rattling, unsettling fashion. Sara feverishly whispers to Suzy about how that must be the school’s true headmistress, said to be away. Nothing really happens here, but it is an intense scene, visually striking, and heightening the story’s sense of mystery and threat.

One other key to the film’s success which could not be overstated is the center provided by Jessica Harper, who plays Suzy. Apparently Argento had originally wanted the dancers to all be children no older than 12, but the producer (his father) was concerned that censors wouldn’t pass a film with such violence if it featured kids (the script, however was never changed, which explains some of the childish interactions of the clearly adult actresses – also, to maintain the feeling of children, all doorknobs on the set were placed at about Harper’s head level).

Slight of frame, with big, gently curious eyes, Harper brings a childlike quality to the role, without at all behaving immaturely. She instead carries an awareness, a self-assurance throughout as she questions the stern headmistress about the killings, interviews psychiatrists about witchcraft, or squares off against the ancient occultist behind the curtain. Her stature and costuming implies vulnerability and youth, but her character is willful, steady, and intelligent.

Furthermore, Harper plays every moment with a kind of quiet sincerity, lending credence to the sometimes wild turn of events around her. Sometimes characters don’t seem to realize that they are in a horror movie, but Suzy seems to from the first time that the airport doors slide open and the sounds of mysterious threat starts screaming at her through the pounding rain. She can’t hear the soundtrack, but it feels like she is properly unnerved by it nonetheless. Without her at the film’s core, the often mad, if beautiful, pageant of aesthetic horrors might really not hold together (a criticism that could be levied against Argento’s follow up, Inferno).

Finally, it would be an oversight not to give any attention to the violence of the film, which is also unique, stunning, and potent. As is often the case with Argento, it is in the kill scenes that his cinematic flair most comes to play. Pat’s face pressed through the window, the knife seen entering her still beating heart, her friend dead on the floor of this grand lobby, a pane of glass splitting her face, the blind pianist threatened in the wide open, empty town square in the middle of the night, fascistically imperial monuments on all sides, only to be attacked from a totally unexpected direction, Sara in the razor wire, before the blade is pulled, graphically across her flesh, Markos with the crystal peacock feather pressed through her rotting neck; each kill is preceded by a sustained, tense game of teasing suspense and shock, and with few exceptions, each death is seductively beautiful.

Even in its brutality, the violence of the film is artful. I feel like each drop of blood, each pin in an eye, each shard of glass piercing the skin has been placed with great care, balancing horror movie scares that can startle or disgust with visual compositions that the eye doesn’t want to look away from.

Are there moments that don’t work? Sure (a certain bat attack and fake dog mouth come to mind). Does my attention sometimes wander a bit until the next extraordinary visual or sequence is presented? Yeah, I’ll admit it. But for me, those things just don’t matter so much. It is a unique monster of a film, the product of a singular vision, and a tremendous success. Though the tale is one of murder and horrors, full of hostility and brutality and unsettling moments and gore, the total effect for me is one of delight, every frame filled with the obvious joy of artists making exactly the thing that most excited them, and doing it so very well.

It must also be said that I do dearly love Guadagnino’s 2018 remake as well. They are such very different films, but each revels in a kind of excess (Argento’s being a maximalist aesthetic trip and Guadagnino’s being so overfull with ideas and history and character), and each creates a space in which I love to dwell. I think in a case like this, they need not be in competition and a fan need not take sides. You can love all your kids, but maybe you love some of them in different ways.

Argento and Aesthetic Terror: Inferno, Tenebrae, Phenomena, and Opera

Posted on September 21, 2022 by Glen — No Comments ↓

Recently I was down in Italy for a bit and, as mentioned in my last post, a highlight was getting to visit Profondo Rosso, the book/memorabilia store co-owned by Dario Argento and Luigi Cozzi. Obviously, I’m a fan of Argento’s work or it wouldn’t have been such a must-see, and yet, in one year of writing this blog, I’ve not yet tackled any of his films. How could this be? Perhaps he’s just loomed so large that it’s been intimidating? Perhaps, while I’d torn through his most acclaimed works when I was first really getting into horror many years ago, and he made such a deep impression, I haven’t necessarily returned to him with great regularity over the years, and it just hasn’t been at the forefront of my mind. Perhaps I just loved the sometimes maligned remake of Suspiria so much that, out of a kind of loyalty, I wrote about it before the original. I don’t know, but in any case, it’s time to remedy this fact.

It’s common to view his output in a few stages. The first consists of his “animal trilogy,” his first three gialli, all with some animal title: The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Cat O’Nine Tails, and Four Flies on Black Velvet. Of these, I’ve only seen the first. The second stage could be deemed his “golden years,” spanning from Profondo Rosso in 1975 until Opera in 1987. And then things start going downhill. There were still occasional flashes of brilliance in the next decade (The Stendhal Syndrome has its moments and I’ve read that Sleepless is worth the watch), but they were found among considerably less inspired work, and for the last twenty years, there has been little to recommend, hitting a nadir in 2012 with the unfortunate Dracula 3D (but I am holding out hope for his new film, Dark Glasses (coming this year) – it’s never too late for a return to form). Today, in order to paint a picture of this idiosyncratic, characteristic artist, I’d like to look at four works from his golden years: Inferno (1980), Tenebrae (1982), Phenomena (1985), and Opera (1987). Though these films are very different from one another, there are clear artistic preoccupations and practices that run through them, and taken as a whole, I think they offer an interesting portrait of this influential film maker. And someday I’ll tackle Profondo Rosso and Suspiria, each of which probably merits its own post.

Also, for a change, I’m going to be good about spoilers here. Coming out of the Italian giallo tradition, these films all turn on late plot twists and they really can be spoiled.

Inferno (1980)

A follow up to Suspiria and a continuation of the “three mothers” mythology of that earlier film (there being three ancient witches ruling the world), Inferno is a wild, fevered, occasionally brilliant, generally shambolic ride. In many ways, Argento takes many of his own tendencies to their logical extremes, both to good and ill effect. He doubles down on the bold, non-realistic use of saturated color that served him so well in Suspiria, lending the proceedings a surreal air. The kill scenes are all tight as a drum: suspenseful, creative, scary, and weird. The story is secondary to an ominous mood of being observed, hunted, and manipulated by powers beyond your ken and there is a threatening sense that no one is safe as each person who might be the protagonist is dispatched until only one remains, and that is probably just because the film had to end sooner or later – if it had been longer, he probably would have died too, to be replaced by yet another potential victim. It is mysterious, unpredictable, captivating, and a little difficult to hold onto.

The story, such as it is, is spare: a woman in a striking old New York building falls down a rabbit hole of three mothers lore (and down a literal hole, into a flooded, sub-basement corpse ballroom) and writes her brother in Rome, begging him to come to her, which he does. Everyone who seems interested in understanding the power of these three witches is hunted down and killed in spectacular fashion. Finally, the brother finds Mater Tenebrarum, the Mother of Darkness, in the basement, leading to a fiery, if inconclusive, conclusion. But more so than any other Argento piece I’ve seen, Inferno is disinterested in narrative. It is a film of moments, of uncanny, intense sequences which you have to be in the right mood for; if you don’t think too much about the plot and just go with it, you will be taken to some crazy, intense, glorious places (but that lack of a narrative center can also make it a difficult watch – I must say, it’s not my favorite). In this regard, it brings to mind Fulci’s Gates of Hell trilogy, but whereas Fulci prioritizes the horror of nightmare revulsion over narrative, Argento leans into the thrill of nightmare style. But they’re both more nightmare than story.

A woman dives into a flooded ballroom to retrieve her keys and is startled by the corpses that float into view. Desperately, she escapes them (though they aren’t actually moving or doing anything, it feels like they chase her, as if they will reach out and attack). During a seminar, a music student reads about the three mothers and looks up to see a mysterious, beautiful woman holding a cat, staring him down and intensely speaking something unheard as the wind blows the windows open and the room feels full of magic and power and danger. A woman enters a library seeking forbidden knowledge and other patrons watch her slyly as if they’ve been waiting. Book in hand, she ventures into the basement where she stumbles upon a demonic book binder in a hellish workshop who tries to catch her and steal the tome (though until ten minutes earlier, he could have just gone upstairs and taken it from the shelf). Scared to be alone, a woman invites a stranger into her apartment to wait for a friend. She plays a record and tells him of the dark forces she fears. Suddenly the music and the lights start cutting out and flickering on again. The tension is ratcheted up as the stranger makes his way to the fuse box, ignoring her plea not to be left alone. Out of sight, he carries on a conversation with her until, after one moment of silence, she finds him with a knife through his neck. In his death throes, he falls upon her, pinning her down and dooming her to a similar fate. When the friend arrives, she falls right through a thin fabric wall (who built this apartment?) to reveal the horrors that have occurred. It goes on and on.

There may not be a protagonist. There may barely be a story. But every 10-15 minutes, there is a fresh, beautifully and suspensefully staged phantasmagoric crescendo. Often when people reference Argento, they talk about the colors (mainly because of Suspiria), and they are on display here, but the thing about him is that all this artfulness is in service of effect. There may be themes and imagery that run through his work (close-ups of eyes, voyeurism, identity, doubling, questioning the veracity of seeing, etc.), but it’s never art for art’s sake – it should thrill/terrify most of all – and look really cool while doing it. Inferno delivers that.

Tenebrae (1982)

Whereas Inferno was a hyper-colorful, supernatural, gothic nightmare, with Tenebrae, Argento goes back to his roots, making a tight, twisty giallo thriller. There’s nothing supernatural; just a twisted killer hunting down pretty girls and the American crime author-cum-investigator who gets pulled into the stylish mayhem. Also, as a change of direction, it is all so white. Filmed in a modernist, brutalist, uncrowded Roman suburb, everything is sunny, out in the open, and exposed. And you just know that if a room is all white in a movie like this, sooner or later, it’s going to get painted red with an arterial spray; and when it does, it is truly a sight to behold – gruesome, gorgeous, terrifying and without warning.

The title references a pre-Easter church service in which the lights are extinguished one by one until there is a piercing sound, symbolizing the “total loss of god’s presence.” With this film’s religiously motivated killer, it is a fitting match. The film begins so bright, so stylish; and it is so much fun. The first kill sets the tone – the whole film is a flash of a blade in the dark, a slick, surprising, sometimes funny, sometimes scary romp. Throughout, there are moments of lightness and comedy (see John Saxon and his miraculous hat), and playful jump scares and plot twists. But by the end, the lights have all gone out and we are alone, screaming in the rain, having witnessed deadly art (literally – a very pointy statue plays a role).

A great example of this open and sunny, yet tense, vibe is the death of the main character’s literary agent, Bullmer, played by John Saxon. This is a unique set up – there’s no chase and the victim is taken completely by surprise, but for the viewer, there’s a fascinating, growing sense that something is wrong – something is going to happen – but what is it? Where will it come from? A series of innocuous images come together to imply danger in this open, “normal” space:

We see Bullmer standing in a modern piazza. It’s all concrete and right angles, suggesting open space and passages to other areas. He goes and sits on a bench in the center of the square. People are going about their lives. A boy chases a bouncing ball. An old man greets a woman at a café, kissing her hand. A young man shouts at his girlfriend. Some punks stand outside a shop window, looking shifty. He takes in the life all around, enjoying it, but checking his watch; he’s waiting for his lover (who received a mysterious gift of red pumps in the previous scene). A droning, apprehensive bit of music begins, accompanying a series of short cuts: The young man yelling at his girlfriend and storming off. Bullmer looking concerned, but also like it’s not his business. The crying girl now walking in his direction. Bullmer rising and some people bumping into him. The crying lady still approaching. His face watching her – then a shadow falls over him, and he turns. He looks surprised, then happy. A blade in front of his abdomen. His face, concerned. Stab in the belly. Face in pain. Another stab. Another reaction. We see the ground and then his beloved hat falls onto it. We see him collapse in front of the bench. Crying lady approaching – she hasn’t seen anything yet. Shot of him as her legs enter the frame – he reaches out to catch her dress. Her face looking down – scream. On him, her legs, more legs run in. A crowd has formed around him. The red pumps walking, entering the crowd. Shot of him from above, dead. The red pumps back away, exit the scene.

There are much flashier kills in this movie, but this is such a masterful exercise in building tension out of nothing and it’s put together with such a confident hand that I can’t be the first to liken it to Hitchcock’s “shower scene.” There’s really no reason to be scared, but the tension builds, culminating in a brutal murder in broad day light in a populated area where no one sees a thing. No place is safe. And no time.

Add in the famous, gratuitous, because-we-can, long crane shot, the psycho-sexual-repression fueled violence, the meta-play of the film containing both a book called Tenebrae, which the killer bases his crimes on, and a character getting killed while listening to the record of the Tenebrae soundtrack, both giving the sense that Argento is looking directly at the viewer and his critics (mirroring himself with a horror writer who uses his artistry to manipulate), a rockin’ Goblin soundtrack, and some real narrative surprises and scares that deliver searing cinematic pleasure, and you’ve got a little masterpiece.

Phenomena (1985)

This next one is pretty strange, but for whatever reason, it holds a real warm spot in my heart. Jennifer Connelly, just before Labyrinth, plays Jennifer Corvino, a young girl with a psychic connection to insects, sent to a strict Swiss boarding school while her famous actor father is off filming a movie. Unfortunately, there is a vicious killer on the loose, targeting girls her age. So it’s up to her, a friendly entomologist played by Donald Pleasance at his warmest, his helper chimpanzee and Jennifer’s army of creepy crawlies to save the day. This is all accompanied by Argento’s usual visual flair, some of the spookiest music Goblin ever produced, and some oddly placed excerpts of heavy metal which often feel completely out of place.

An element I love here is the atmospheric use of nature. Set in a part of Switzerland (referred to in the film as the “Swiss Transylvania”) where the wind coming off of the mountains drives people mad, the supernatural vibe is rich. It all feels other than human, bigger, alien, and yet it is just the natural world in a very “civilized,” populated area – this is not the wilderness, but this totally normal, natural world is made to feel uncanny, weird, and threatening. The trees are always creaking, the wind never stops howling, and Jennifer’s insects are always on the move. It really creates a mood, an enveloping horror atmosphere in which I just love to dwell.

Also, I expect that the fact this was filmed right before Labyrinth (which I watched with great frequency when I was younger) lends it a strong taste of nostalgia even if I didn’t see it until my early 20s. Connelly delivers a similar, if perhaps more impassive performance, and she serves as a strong center around which the story can revolve. She is of course sometimes upset, vexed by the bug eyed murder visions that haunt her dreams, the teasing at school, the being kidnapped, drugged, and dumped in a rotting pool of human compost, but she is also often quite placid, at peace with the swarm outside the window, linked to a nature that buzzes gently without great emotional disturbance.

Finally, what makes this film so lovable is how utterly crazy it is. It is filled with odd choices from top to bottom that just shouldn’t work (and sometimes, to be fair, they don’t), but usually do. And its execution of those weird choices sings with Argento’s usual sensory bravado, taking a plot description that could apply to an odd, charming, so-bad-it’s-good B-movie, and instead offering up a wild, glorious, so-weird-it’s-great powerhouse. I mean, at a key moment, the chimp shows up out of nowhere and attacks someone with a straight razor! How could anyone not love this oddball little movie?

But, as I said, not everything works. I think anyone who enjoys Argento, and Italian horror in general, knows that sometimes you just have to accept some things. It will always be dubbed, poorly, and the dialogue that makes it through will always seem strained and unnatural. This is no exception. Most of the characters speak in a stilted, on-the-nose fashion that can be laughable. But you can laugh, and love it, and go along for the ride, which is worth it (and in this case, having Connelly and Pleasance in such prominent roles, dubbing themselves, means that they can bring something slightly more natural to their text, so that’s nice). Also, as mentioned above, for the first time, Argento used modern music not composed for the film – it seems that he’d just gotten into Iron Maiden and Motörhead and had to include them…it doesn’t work. These are bands I like – I sympathize, but Argento just doesn’t stick the landing with matching the sound to the picture. But I’ve heard that while we may respect someone for their strengths, we love them for their faults, and that is clearly the case here. Somehow, all of the little things that don’t work, or the big things such as these music choices, just make me love the movie more – not in spite of its mis-steps, but because of them.

This, and all of Argento’s classic work, is clearly the product of an auteur – it always seems like one creator’s vision: sometimes peculiar, often intense, never dull. These are clearly not studio pictures with dictates from a group of risk-averse accountants. Argento takes big swings – and sometimes he doesn’t connect, but other times he knocks it out of the park. In Phenomena, everything is of a piece, from classic giallo kill sequences and plot twists, to the balance of beautiful, atmospheric original music and thrashing guitars, to the wind rustling the leaves and the chimp wielding a razor, to the juxtaposition of Jennifer’s peaceful communion with the insects and those insects tearing apart one who tries to harm her. It is a unique film, and one which I always find great pleasure in.

Opera (1987)

Considered by many to be Argento’s last great film (though others have said the same about Tenebrae or Suspiria or Profondo Rosso, so who knows…), this is a tight, often horrific thriller about a understudy thrust into the lead role in an avant-garde production of Verdi’s Macbeth, hounded by a killer who ties her up and tapes a row of needles under each eye to force her to watch the murders he commits. It is filmed with Argento’s characteristic verve, and it balances his visual creativity with a narrative that really holds together, even with its classic giallo character reversals and shocking twist revelations.

If anything, though there are really striking images (such as the needles under the eyes) and wild, propulsive film making (notably, all of the scenes of the opera in rehearsal or performance, or the raven eyed shots employed in the final act), this is the most conventional of all of the films we’re looking at today (possibly forecasting the direction he’d go in the next decade). Sure, there are still crazy moments, and funny character beats, and some really horrific sequences, but it feels more like it exists in our world. The stylishness is restricted to the work of the camera, the editing, and the scoring, but the people and fashions and locations (with the exception of the opera setting) all feel more “normal,” like they could fit in with any late 80s/early 90s crime thriller. Furthermore, it’s painted in much a more muted palette: murky beiges, tans, and browns.

But I don’t want to undersell its thrills either. From the opening shot of the opera house reflected in the eye of a raven, you can tell you’re in for something special. However murky this world may be, the cinematography is dazzling. The camera swoops like a bird. It creeps into places it shouldn’t be able to. It is constantly switching perspectives. Now we look through the eyes of the raven. Now through the eyes of the diva who refuses to sing with the bird and storms out of the opera house to get hit by a car. Now through the eyes of the killer. Now through the eyes of Betty, the young understudy who’s made to watch all the blood being shed. It even hides inside a door peephole, seeing the barrel of a gun, and then a bullet flying towards it, cutting away just in time for that bullet to fly out the back of a victim’s head. Argento has often circled the issue of seeing – witnessing – watching. Eyes have always been a preoccupation of his. The truth of what has been seen has regularly been called into doubt (see the late revelations in Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Profondo Rosso, and Tenebrae). In Opera, from one moment to the next, we’re not always sure what we’re watching: is it concurrent action, a memory, or a dark fantasy?

When the killer makes Betty watch, tied up, a victim of sight, Argento takes a sadistic pleasure in doing the same to us. And the violence here feels more realistic than in previous films. This may just reflect advancements in film technology that had taken place over the course of the decade, but I feel it’s an artistic choice. Just as the colors are less vibrant, so too is the violence less artificial and more grisly. The two elements are of a piece.

Then, the film ends on a peculiar note. Having been chased out to a rural landscape like something out of Phenomena (and actually, I’d misremembered this and thought it had actually been the final shot of that earlier film), Betty finally overcomes the killer and after a short interchange with the police, lies down in the tall grass and wildflowers to look at a lizard and disappear into the natural world. After the gloomy tones of the majority of the film, suddenly everything is so vivid and green. In voiceover, she speaks of how this will be her beauty now. She is done with “art,” of watching and being put on display, of human machinations and creation. Was Argento communicating the same? I mean, he’s continued making films for another thirty years, but maybe he was just in a bad place – he’d just broken up with long time romantic and artistic partner Daria Nicolodi (who had been in almost all of his films since Profondo Rosso and sometimes shared screenwriting credit), who begrudgingly agreed to be in this one because her death scene was going to be so spectacular, and apparently the inspiration for the film had been Argento’s own artistic failure of directing Verdi’s Macbeth himself.

Argento: a style all his own

These are four strikingly distinct films, ranging from a nigh-abstract, supernatural, technicolor dreamscape, to a blindingly white, crisp psycho-thriller, to a nature infused insect-girl/razor-ape flick, to a psychological, gory horror show that problematizes watching, that questions art. And yet, each so clearly feels like it is from the same creator. The particular flourish with which he films what is often nonsensical or insane, the care taken in crafting the aesthetics of each piece, the recurring key images or themes, the maximalist glee with which he throws everything and the kitchen sink into a film to create an overwhelming sensory experience, and the freeing extent to which he just doesn’t give a damn about things that aren’t interesting to him (logic, how operas work, why things blow up or don’t, how dogs protect territory and don’t hunt girls endlessly for no reason, what Rhode Island looks like; this list could be its own post) – all this comes together to make a film feel like his and no one else’s. And isn’t the world more interesting, more delicious, more exquisite for it?