Dario Argento

(In French, On Cable TV, June 2021) While I haven’t seen all of writer-director Dario Argento’s filmography yet, I have a strong preference for his supernatural films over the more “realistic” ones. Tenebre is similar to other Argento films in that it features an American in Rome, getting embroiled in a sordid series of murders and the hunt for the killer. Like other Argento films, it’s also very stylish — colourful, with strong images and deliberate directing choices. There’s not much left to happenstance or merely “ordinary” filmmaking here. With Goblin providing the score and a typically twisted psychology at the root of the film’s premise, the film feels very much of a piece with other parts of his filmography. Structurally, the film is clearly made around its high-strung death sequences, going from one horrifying sequence to another but not forgetting to have a rather sophisticated narrative to wrap it all up. In the grand tradition of giallo, it takes a repulsive kind of serial-killer story and makes it more watchable by sheer injection of style. I’m still not a fan, but as a late-period giallo Tenebre is significantly more watchable than the explosion of slasher movies that took place at the same time in the United States.

(In French, On Cable TV, November 2020) Once again in a giallo film, we have an innocent man getting drawn into investigating a lurid string of murders, in a film elevating an already-wild screenplay with stylish composition, colour, cinematography and musical choices. That Cat o’ Nine Tails is coming from giallo grandmaster Dario Argento only makes it further essential viewing in its subgenre. Here, the big wrinkle is a blind protagonist, and pseudo-scientific nonsense about the XYY gene turning people into killers or something. Of course, the fun of the film is in the ride more than the destination, with stylistic fillips that feel more modern than its early 1970s era of filmmaking. It’s more interesting than a strictly realistic take on the same topic would have been, although there are clear limits to this kind of material. I’d probably have more to say about Cat O’ Nine Tails if I hadn’t seen something like half a dozen similar movies in the past week (thank a giallo movie marathon for that jadedness), but that’s kind of the point: if you like giallo, it’s a stylistic genre more than a narrative one, so there’s a good chance that you’ll like one more.

(In French, On Cable TV, November 2020) I was pretty sure that I didn’t like giallo, but as I made my way through Dario Argento’s debut feature The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, it struck me that I didn’t dislike the genre as much as I thought I did. In fact, giallo looks much better when placed next to the slasher horror that it inspired in the Halloween/Friday-the-13^th/Black Christmas tradition. Argento’s debut feature predates all of this, obviously: Working in 1970, Argento was more clearly inspired by classic horror—albeit with more bright-red blood. Where this film does well, as is usually the case with giallo, is presented a much-heightened vision of standard horror thrills. Exuberant with colours, unusual camera angles, subjective viewpoints and an aggressive soundtrack, giallo is usually far more interesting than the stories it portrays—although there too, there are plenty of opportunities for being wilder than more staid thrillers. The Bird with the Crystal Plumage does have a familiar base premise—an innocent man investigating a murder in a foreign location, something that would pop up again later in Argento’s career in films such as Deep Red—but it adds a few striking wrinkles to it. The result is quite watchable: still effective in its stylish excess, and benefiting from a generally solid script. It also unlocked the key to giallo as far as I’m concerned, as a far more interesting stylistic variant on the usually dull slasher films that would follow.

(TubiTV Streaming, May 2017) At first glance, there is no way I thought I’d like Suspiria. I abhor most slasher films; my rare contacts with Italian giallo films have been unpleasant; and the thought of another movie with a psycho cutting down young women in garish detail is enough to make me queasy. But after actually watching the film, I’ll concede that Suspiria at least commits to its grand-guignol madness. Long before American Horror started leaning on a self-aware shtick, Dario Argento pushes the limits of his barely coherent premise into showy set-pieces. Colourful to a degree that’s not even close to subtle, Suspiria keeps one-upping its murderous set-pieces to the point of nearly approaching abstract art: The first big horror sequence of the film ends with a body being hung/thrown through a skylight, and another woman being killed by the glass debris. Terrible, but weirdly successful at once. Don’t look for a tightly plotted story—Suspiria is about the atmosphere more than narrative, and that atmosphere starts early on—even a relatively innocuous airport arrival sequence is made instantly dreadful by the use of red lighting and an oppressive synthetic score. Suspiria isn’t the kind of film that you’d show to anyone sane, but it’s weirdly respectable in its own way. It commits to its madness and doesn’t pull punches in the way it follows its set-pieces to the end. The Technicolor visual styling of the film is impressive even forty years later, and the dreadful quality of its nightmarish atmosphere makes it an interesting film even for those who want nothing to do with psycho-slasher horror films.