Nightmare Fuel 2016 Day 22: Suspiria

It’s taken me way the hell too long, given the film’s reputation, but I’m finally delving into Dario Argento’s Suspiria.  Can’t wait, thought I before hitting Play.

Sometimes I wonder why I still get excited for things.

Now, this isn’t to say that Suspiria is a bad or poorly-made film.  Not really, no.  It’s just…yeah, it didn’t work for me.

The story, such as it is, centers on an American ballet dancer enrolling in a prestigious dance academy in Freiburg, Germany (that’s pronounced “fry-burg”, not “free-burg” as the narrator parses it).  As she arrives, another student, just recently expelled, is leaving in a decent hurry, leading to her eventual murder off campus.  As time progresses, more murders happen in and around the academy, leading the new student to question what’s really going on and to discover some eerie things.

Honestly, the plot is barely important, and it shows.  What matters to Argento, it seems, is atmosphere.  This is a supremely expressionistic film, each shot framed, lit, and colored in such a way as to elicit a sense of unease and/or dread.  In the calmer scenes, you’ll have things like incredibly busy wallpaper patterns or relatively busy editing to keep the viewer from getting complacent, while the more active scenes find the shots bathed in either disconcerting neon-esque light or strong swathes of bright, deep color, usually red.  The music is omnipresent, occasionally off-putting, underlining the sense that nothing in the film is to be taken lightly, without at least some disconcertion.  Further emphasizing things is the acting, which is more body-language focused than dialogue-based, especially in the case of Jessica Harper’s (the actress who plays the American lead) lovely eyes, which are almost perpetually in stages of saucer and dish, communicating a palpable suspense.  This atmosphere is incredibly well-done and well-maintained, the film’s strongest asset.  (In addition, there is an uncredited work of literature used as inspiration for the film: Suspiria de Profundis, written by Thomas de Quincey (most famous for his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater), contains a piece called “Levana and Our Ladies of Sorrow” that imagines three companions for the Roman goddess of childbirth, Our Lady of Tears, of Sighs, and of Darkness.  This work, a landmark in English psychological fantasy, inspired not only Argento’s Suspiria, but also two other works that complete his “Three Mothers” trilogy, Inferno and The Mother of Tears.  De Quincey’s distinct style, which left me a bit put off during Confession, seems translated fairly well by Argento.)

Unfortunately, this atmosphere-centric approach also serves as the film’s ultimate detriment, at least for me.  The aforementioned music, handled by Italian prog rock band Goblin, while serving to help establish the atmosphere, it often far too overbearing and omnipresent to have its intended impact.  Their loud cacophony, often including jangling metal, just took me out of the film instead of drawing me in.  The bare-bones plot, slightly stilted dialogue (I don’t think Argento has ever been accused of great writing), and broad acting further diminish my ability to get fully absorbed in the action.  Granted, this is mainly a personal gripe, and the visuals tend to overcome many of these obstacles, but it hinders the atmosphere’s pervasiveness for me, and that is the most effective facet of the film, no?

Overall, Suspiria is a powerful film, one that pretty much demands to be studied in film classes (take notes, burgeoning cinematographers), but one that isn’t an easy sit by any stretch of the imagination (likely Argento’s intention).  I’d recommend it for a watch, but I would caution against anticipation similar to mine.