A young American dancer named Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper of "Stardust Memories" by Woody Allen fame) comes to an academy which is not an easy place to get in. It is a weird school and it is not what it seems; for one thing weird murders take place. The girl Suzy saw at the door on her arrival and another girl get killed in very bizarre, supernatural way. The instructors, the super, a blind piano player everyone seems odd and in on something. Some more strange stuff happens like "maggot rain" from the infested ceiling (yak!). Suzy decides to find out what is going on.
If you haven’t already seen the movie all that mentioned above may seem silly and not much of a story and you may be right in a way but the visuals of this movie is so overwhelming that it makes up for all that. Actually it is almost as if the story didn’t matter all that much to the legendary Italian director Dario Agento. It feels like
“There is a fragile girl who finds herself in a mysterious atmosphere; there is some sort of diabolic conspiracy going on, yada yada yada… We’ve got the basics down. Now, let’s get the party started!”
The party, so to speak is neon colors, eerie conditions, darkness, storm, light contrast, the edgy noise and music; speaking of music this movie is like a music composition for a huge orchestra, only done by colors and light.
Suspiria is claimed to be Dario Agento’s best work. The style is so unique and if you don’t like it for some reason, you won’t like this or any of his movies for that matter. But it is definitely worth checking out this extremely artistic horror classic.
I’ve never been a fan of dubbed movies especially when the actors don’t actually speak the same language; something done very often in the 70s European movies. I don’t know if the reason for that was commercial concern (if the movie is in English it is obviously going to be more sellable) or simply the main actress didn’t speak Italian or something else; but as I said in the beginning, that’s not the main point of this movie, so let it go.
My memory of Suspiria is:
I saw this one in early 80s. The movie theater was showing 2 movies for the same ticket back to back and I was in for the second movie; it was an action movie name of which I can’t recall now, however... there was some nudity, machine guns and some martial arts (THAT I remember!). So “Suspiria” was the opening movie. I was very young I didn’t understand anything and got a bit scared; in short, I felt uneasy about it, not to mention kind of bored. If I remember correctly I went to toilet and didn’t even come back until it was over. I watched it again only a few months ago after seeing its review somewhere and going
“Wait a minute, I think I saw this one… or did I?”
I was pleasantly surprised because I really enjoyed it this time. It’s definitely not for every horror fan but I’d say give it a chance you and you might like it; especially if this is your sort of thing. Be open minded in other words:
Don’t eat fish expecting it to taste like chicken and you’ll be alright!
G.R.Senn
