Suspiria (1977)
Directed by: Dario Argento
Reviewed by Joshua Taj Bozeman
on Dec 22, 2002
warning- some minor spoilers

I have been wanting to see Suspiria for a long time. I have heard a lot of good things about Italian horror, and especially director Dario Argento. I saw Deep Red about a year ago and I didn't care much for it...so I guess I have already seen some of his work. People rave about him tho, so I wanted to see this. I checked out the DVD version- THX mastered, available DTS 6 channel audio track (I don't have a DTS decoder tho, so that didn't help much), a few tv spots, along with the trailer (both the international and U.S. versions), radio spots, and more...the DVD is nicely done. Big gallery of stills and posters for the film on the DVD as well, which is cool for big fans of the movie. The sound and picture and the DVD are really beautiful...especially the sound, the THX mastering was a nice touch to what seems like a horror classic to many. Thank God for Anchor Bay, huh?

Anyhow, to the story. The movie starts out, and you know this is going to be really weird...I remember Deep Red being really weird as well. In regards to direction and the overall look of the film- amazing. Very tense...Argento seems to love to use weird lighting...weird reds and greens in the scenes, where such colors wouldn't be normal. You don't usually turn off the light in your bedroom and get a green glow from outside, and most boarding houses aren't softly lit by red lights...The camera work is really odd...you get closeups on things you'd never expect to see closeup- lightbulbs get the focus of attention in some shots...a woman's mouth gets the attention in another. Argento also clearly likes using the camera as tho it is a person walking around the movie. There are many times when the camera seems to be a faceless person watching the action. I kept wondering if someone was really in the room with the characters and we were actually getting the POV. The music is nicely done as well, tho it did get a little repetitive. It was all weird synth sounding stuff with howling behind it, which worked as a distraction sometimes- I kept asking myself, 'is that screaming in the movie or the soundtrack?'

Onto the story...a young American woman named Susan is accepted into an acclaimed dancing academy in Europe. She arrives on a stormy night, only to run into another woman running from the building, out into the dark night. A voice on the intercom says she doesn't know who she is and to go away. The woman who is running away from the school, into the woods, arrives at a friend's house where she spends the night. She talks about how she was expelled from the school, but she is clearly scared of something that happened within the place. She is alone in the bathroom, and as she looks into the dark night from the window, eyes appear, and a hand comes in thru the window and slams her face against the glass. Someone gets into the bathroom and stabs her to death...

The American girl comes back to the school the next day, and meets with the teachers and staff, explaining how she saw the young girl running away and how a voice on the intercom told her to go away. They all know of the murder, and the police are there asking questions. We meet the head of the school and one of the teachers, as Susan settles into the new surroundings. Many of the people working at the school and even some of the students act very strange. Susan moves into an apartment off campus with another student, but soon finds herself moved into the school itself when she collapses during a class- blood dripping from her mouth and nose. The staff is taking care of her, putting her on a strict diet, and feeding her red wine with every meal. More strange things happen- to be honest, it's hard to explain the plot, because it's pretty much nonexistant. All I can tell you is that weird things keep happening, and we see that there is something sinister going on at the school. Susan finally investigates further to find out that evil things are taking place within the school's walls. The ending is pretty lame if you ask me, and for the most part, the rest of the story is pretty boring. Other than the visual aspect of the film, Suspiria isn't a very good movie at all. I think Argento could have taken out half the movie and the story would have stayed pretty much the same...there are too many scenes where nothing happens. The action takes forever it seems. The story drags on way too long. Given a more solid story, this could have been a decent movie, but without it, it was more of an attempt at making art with fancy lighting and cool camera moves. In the end, I would skip Suspiria, unless you are a huge Argento fan. I can't remember the exact plot of Deep Red, but I'd say that even it was a bit better than this one, story- wise. If you like cool looking movies that happen to be make little sense, and seem to be out to shock more than tell a good story, maybe Suspiria is for you...if not, then I'd pass...