This post is a part of an ongoing project in which I watch one movie from a different country every week.
PLOT: The newest student at a prestigious ballet academy (Jessica Harper) realizes that supernatural forces are behind a series of murders taking place at her school.
MEMORABLE MOMENT: The film opens with a narrator telling us that a girl named Suzy Bannion has been accepted into a dance academy. We meet her walking along an airport hallway toward a pair of automatic doors. The audience has been told everything. The setting is well lit and populated. However, haunting music (composed by the band Goblin) plays at full blast in the background. The music, which is arguably even more haunting than the Halloween theme or “Tubular Bells” from The Exorcist, lets us know that things are about to go very wrong for poor Suzy.
- Director Dario Argento originally wanted all the students at the dance academy to be younger than twelve. However, the studio and producer Salvatore Argento (his father) stated that a film this violent involving children would be banned. Dario turned the characters into teenagers but didn’t rewrite the script, hence the naiveté of the characters and the childlike dialogue. (Honestly, this explains a lot of the bizarre interactions between women in their late teens.)
- Director Dario Argento composed the creepy music with the band Goblin and played it at full blast on set to unnerve the actors.
- Dario Argento was inspired to make this film by stories from his fellow screenwriter, Daria Nicolodi whose grandmother claimed to have fled from a German music academy because witchcraft was secretly practiced there.
- The first of the director’s “Three Mothers” trilogy, which continued with the films Inferno (1980) – not the Tom Hanks movie – and Mother of Tears (2007).
WHO IS THIS MOVIE FOR?: If you are a fan of horror, Suspiria is required viewing, the same way Alien or Blade Runner is required for fans of sci-fi. Had this film been made in America it would be up there with The Shining and Rosemary’s Baby as an intelligent horror film that’s a household name.
Even if you aren’t particularly fond of horror this is a movie for anyone who enjoys films by David Lynch, Darren Aronofsky, early Tim Burtin or any filmmaker that delves into the weird. Suspiria isn’t particularly violent. Don’t get me wrong, there are a some gory scenes but for the most part the fear found in this film doesn’t come from serial killers or blood drenched knives (although one of those does make an appearance).
Suspiria is set in a world where everything is a little…off. The lighting, angles and colors are over the top (this is arguably the most colorful horror film ever made) and as I already mentioned the characters act in ways that don’t fit their age or the situation. There is an unsettling creepiness lurking in the shadows. We often can’t put our finger on what is bothering us, we just know it’s there.
This is not a film for people looking for logic. Even after the end credits roll, much of the story still doesn’t make sense. However, Suspiria is such a beautiful film, we really don’t care.
WHERE CAN YOU FIND IT?: For some reason this movie isn’t available on Amazon instant but you can buy the blue-ray and DVD. It’s also available on Netflix DVD. I borrowed it for free from the Baltimore County Library System.
RUNTIME: 98 Minutes
DIRECTOR: Dario Argento
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