Review of Don't Look Now (1936) by Al M — 15 Apr 2011

Words almost can't convey the sublime horror that is Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now. An absolute masterpiece of the horror genre, Don't Look Now blends beautiful cinematography of Venice together with creative editing and absolutely brilliant uses of montage to create a surrealistic, impressionistic horror experience unlike any other in the entire history of cinema.

Starring the always awesome Donald Sutherland and the ravishing Julie Christie, Don't Look Now portrays a couple torn about by the drowning of their daughter, which occurs in the opening scene. The couple move to Venice where Sutherland's character is restoring an old church.

While in Venice, Sutherland becomes obsessed with a mysterious figure in a red coat similar to one his daughter was wearing when she died. Filled with psychics, premonitions, symbolic motifs, elaborate montages, and a final scene that will creep out even the most seasoned of horror film fans, Don't Look Now is a virtually flawless and beautiful film from beginning to end.

Scandalous upon its release because of its lengthy and graphic (for the time) sex scene between Sutherland and Christie, Don't Look Now remains one of the most powerful meditations upon grief and its effects upon marriage ever put on camera.

Even the passionate sex scene plays into this theme, as the couple literally try to fuck away the child-shaped absence that lies inside them. Poignant, beautiful, and terrifying, Don't Look Now is everything that a film should be--for me, it epitomizes the kind of art that cinema makes possible.