Dario Argento’s gruesome and beautiful fever dream is a sensory experience unlike any other horror film I’ve seen before.
“Do you know anything about witches?”
I had a choice of watching the original Suspiria or the 2018 remake with Dakota Johnson, which I do want to check out eventually. I went with the 1977 version mainly for its run time: short and sweet 98 minutes as opposed to two hours and a half. Way too many movies suffer from bloat these days, and very few horror films need to go over the two hour mark as far as I’m concerned.
“A coven of witches in a dance school” was the extent of my knowledge about the film, but despite my lack of expectations the movie still somehow managed to upend them, probably due to its sheer singular strangeness. It begins with young American ballet student Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper) arriving at a German airport. It’s a mundane scenario, until Argento throws in a bizarre little detail, a quick close-up of the automatic door opening mechanism that felt weirdly menacing. I think I knew then that I was in for a wild and trippy ride.
It’s a dark and stormy night when Suzy arrives at the door of the prestigious Tanz Dance Academy, where she is to perfect her craft. She is refused admittance and has to find another lodgings, but not before she spots a distraught female student flee the school. That same night, the student and her friend in town are both murdered by an unknown assailant, in what is the first of the film’s gory and imaginatively macabre set pieces.
The next day, Suzy is finally allowed inside the school, where she meets the haughty deputy headmistress and Miss Tanner, the head instructor (think stern militaristic German teacher with a severe hairdo and a mouth full of far too many white teeth). The place has other strange types hanging around: a grotesque servant, a creepy matron and an even creepier blonde boy. A series of unsettling events follows including violent deaths, leaving Suzy the only one with a chance to piece together the evil secret behind the school.
It feels strange to say that Suspiria’s weaknesses in regards to the plot, characters, dialogue and acting don’t actually hurt it much. The only time I felt the movie dropped the ball was during the clumsy exposition dump late into the story, which grinds the whole thing to a halt. Overall, it’s best seen as an adult and extremely twisted fairy tale, with a simple story that shouldn’t be subjected to logic. The characters don’t rise above flat archetypes, but Jessica Harper does have a perfect look for a heroine caught in a dark fantastical tale, with her delicate physique, childlike innocence and wide-eyed expressions. The stilted, melodramatic acting that would normally come off as just plain bad acting in most movies somehow fits the dreamlike, unreal mood here.
What really makes you forget all the conventional flaws is the overwhelming, unearthly quality of the visuals and music. It was interesting to watch this movie after the near-monochromatic beauty of Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow, because Suspiria goes to the other extreme and embraces colour to the hyper-saturated max. The dramatic lighting shifts between the primary hues of red, blue and green, and the extravagant, baroque interiors are likewise rich in colour. The style is a mix of Art Deco and Art Nouveau, with strong geometric shapes in some places and natural, floral motifs in others. Adding to the surreal atmosphere is the soundtrack by prog-rock group Goblin, with the main synth-based theme now playing on a loop in my brain like some spooky ringtone.
And then there are the elaborate horror set pieces, usually built around an untimely and brutal demise of a character who got too close to the truth. Some of the visual effects may be dated, and that 1970s movie blood may look too much like bright red cherry syrup, but there were still plenty of shocking, creepy or unnerving moments. It all culminates in a splendidly overwrought finale that might have been a teensy bit rushed, but still very effective.
I’d really love to see this one-of-a-kind movie on a big screen, if there’s ever a special screening at the Astor or Classic Cinemas.
