I’ve never seen a giallo horror movie before, but if Dario Argento’s Suspiria is anything to go by, it’s probably not a genre I’d like all that much. This movie is interesting, a near even mix of Italian exploitation and New Hollywood thriller in its style and influence; it’s pretty in its lush production design and vivid use of colour; but its story is rather weak, its characters sadly flat, the performances even more so, and the scares, creative and memorable though they are, are much more aesthetically noteworthy than actually scary.
Jessica Harper stars as Suzy Bannion, an American ballet student coming to study at the prestigious Tanz Dance Academy in Freiburg, Germany. But a series of gruesome murders targeting people connected with the school disturbs her and the other students, eventually proving to be a conspiracy linked to the secret history of the school itself.
Giallo is a sub-genre characterized by murder-mysteries, often incorporating elements of psychological thriller, supernatural horror, or even slasher and exploitation. And Suspiria very much has the plot and pace of a slasher film in particular. The key distinguishing supernatural point of Tanz being a front for a coven of witches isn’t introduced until the last act, which makes sense with the mystery the movie is trying to build. But because of that, the movie lags for long stretches, which isn’t good when the story is already mostly predictable and the performances don’t come across.
The easiest qualm to have with this movie is the poor dubbing. But it is something that bothers me. Dubbing in live-action films I’ve never really liked; the contrast between dialogue and lip movement being distracting enough without the lines sounding just a little bit off tonally. The cast of Suspiria was made up of English, Italian, and German-speaking actors, and all delivered their parts in their own language. And while they do a good enough job acting like they understand what each other is saying, the disconnect is still present. Obviously to keep consistent sound mixing, even the English-speaking actors like Harper and Joan Bennett had to dub over their own lines, and this too is noticeable in a few instances.
It doesn’t help matters that none of the performances are very exceptional. They aren’t exactly bad, but no one really seems to be giving their strongest effort. Harper is good in the fearful scenes, particularly the climax where she’s essentially the “last girl” and conveys some genuine terror, but only seems to be mildly concerned elsewhere in the movie. She’s also a rather passive protagonist, like the worst of slasher movie heroines, only the mildest of a personality can be gleaned from her. Her friend Sarah, played by Stefania Casini, arguably has more character development. Bennett and Alida Valli are better as the principal antagonists, though they’re written as standard strict matrons without any depth. Udo Kier is okay in his small role as the man who explains Tanz’s history with witchcraft to a naive Suzy. And nobody else leaves any impression except by virtue of their character deaths.
I will say though these deaths are pretty well done. They’re greatly paced, inventive, and graphic, reminding me a little of something from an Evil Dead movie. The poor girl in the beginning, amusingly named Pat Hingle is stabbed multiple times, including vividly in the heart, and then dramatically is thrown on a noose through the stained glass ceiling of the house she was trying to keep shelter in. This is actually a really good way to start the movie, with a girl not unlike Suzy discovering a horrific secret and being murdered for it, her friend also dying as a result of being impaled by a falling shard. Suzy even sees her running away just as she’s being driven to the school from the airport. The latter two deaths are also pretty good, with the blind pianists’ dog being willed to maul him a clever enough kill, and the tension is really built up well in the lead up to Sara’s death from the moment Suzie falls unconscious. But while these are good sequences, neither is particularly great enough to warrant a place among numerous films that have done similar horror better. The dropping larvae could have been really inspired, but feels somehow conventional. The creepiest part of the movie is probably in the climax where the witch Helena Markos reanimates the body of Sara to try and kill Suzie. Something about the look of her, with the bloody scratches all along her face and body, her mouth hanging agape is pretty effectively frightening. The movie does do gore well, or at least stylishly. In addition to the aforementioned heart stabbing, there’s a shot of the dead companion of that victim with a shard of glass right through her face and it’s a pretty good effect. The level of practical gore and highly saturated bright red tint of the blood is heavily reminiscent of a lot of Hammer Horror films.
And let it not be said that Dario Argento doesn’t know how to build atmosphere. In fact that’s what the movie is trying to get by on. He is incredibly good at setting an eerie mood, shooting locations in discomforting ways and emphasizing art design and music as integral to a horror’s effect. In pace and especially music, Suspiria echoes The Exorcist, against which critics compared the movie unfavourably when it first came out. Much like how prog rock music was used to great effect in that film, Argento hired the Italian band Goblin to compose the score for Suspiria before the movie was even shot. Nevertheless, its’ foreboding pitch and tempo is exceptionally resonant, lending an uncanny air to the situation of a scene. And the look of the film is stimulating, full of vibrant yet unnatural colours, heavily inspired by Disney movies of all things (Snow White specifically, as Argento wanted to replicate the look of that film in live-action). I certainly don’t think it achieves the visual splendour of an early Disney movie, but it is really nice, and fascinating in composition. Argento even used the same imbibition process of early Hollywood Technicolour films, like The Wizard of Oz and The Adventures of Robin Hood, noted for how clear and bold the colours appeared through this method. Likewise, the colours of Suspiria stand out terrifically.
So what we have is a visually splendid and atmospheric movie with clever horror touches and gore, but not anything substantially scary; and with a bland plot and blander characters terribly dubbed and impossible to invest in. Argento’s style definitely has me curious to see more of his work in the future, but Suspiria doesn’t grab me much on its own merits. I see the appeal to a degree, but I don’t share it. The recent remake helmed by Luca Guadagnino I am interested in however, especially if it can replicate Argento’s flourish with stronger performances (led by Tilda Swinton and Dakota Johnson, so that’s promising). The original Suspiria however is a fascinating, even mesmerizing, but regrettably disappointing movie I probably won’t be returning to in the Halloweens to come.
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