Review of Suspiria (1977) by Eddie G — 27 Feb 2011

Did Dario Argento decide to shoot his first draft? Argento is like the majority of horror filmmakers; he thinks he's clever and knows how to scare his audiences so he gets too excited for the conclusion of his scenes that he forgets to have a good buildup to make us care.

This is a film about witches at a ballet academy but we only get a tiny scene of dance (and the main character never dances) and we don't even get the suspicion they are witches until an hour into the film.

On top of that the dialogue is awful. If they are not speaking directly towards the plot they sound absolutely dreadful. "This is my nephew, he means a lot to me." And it doesn't help to have actresses that show no emotion for such a lifeless script.

Jessica Harper was the only one worth watching throughout the entire film. The ADR on people that either spoke a different language or had strong accents (I guess that's why he did it?) was horribly off and was distracting.

The death scenes were simply hilarious. First we have the girl being slammed up against the window. The shot outside of her skin being smooshed was really funny. Then we have the friend who jumps into a pit of what's supposed to be barbed wire.

Can't you try harder to make it look like barbed wire at least? And if it wasn't barbed wire, why the heck was she screaming? And how did she not see that before she jumped? Then we have the blind guy with his dog.

Here was the idea, lets see a big white building and the emptiness around while the dog is going crazy by something that's not being shown, but we'll keep pointing to the big white building. The scene drags on way too long and has no clue what it's doing.

The dog attacking was a cool bit though. The music to Suspiria is brilliant. It completely sets the atmosphere and unsettles the viewer. The theme song is like a music box. Snuck into the theme comes a voice.

Argento never wants to leave his audience alone. Some of the background is just ambient sounds, which works perfectly as well. The set decoration, the cinematography, and the lighting all give the movie the look that it needs.

I loved the mixture of green, red, and blue throughout the film. And the disorientation of the circular room before you enter the witches chamber was really interesting. However, it's not enough to save the mess that the script gives.

I can see now why DGG was going to remake it: he could have either made it understand that it's quite funny with unsettling moments, or could have actually made it scary. Either way, the movie being unintentionally funny takes away what Suspiria could have possibly been.

It's a shame, really, because it has so much going for it.