Suspiria (1977)

Suspiria
Directed by Dario Argento
Written by Dario Argento and Daria Nicolodi
1977/Italy
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die
One of 1000 Greatest Horror Movies on They Shoot Zombies, Don’t They?

Madame Blanc: We must get rid of that bitch of an American girl. Vanish! She must vanish! Make her disappear! Understand? Vanish, she must vanish. She must die! Die! Die! Helena, give me power. Sickness! Sickness! Away with her! Away with trouble. Death, death, death!

Dario Argento throws everything but the kitchen sink at a very slight plot to create the ultimate slasher film.

Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper), a young dancer, has been accepted as a student at a prestigious dance academy in Germany.  She takes a taxi to the place in torrential rain and is denied entrance by a feminine voice who says something unintelligible including the words “secret” and “iris”.

When she is finally admitted, she discovers the academy is decorated in an extravagant combination of pop art and art nouveau.  The staff is very, very creepy.  Soon people start dropping like flies.

Suzy wants to get to the bottom of these goings on (somehow the police are never called) and puts herself in greater and greater danger.  Blah, blah, blah … something to do with witches.

OK, I could hardly follow the plot not that it matters much.  What we do have in plenty is highly stylish art direction, brilliant cinematography – much of which is saturated in various colors, and some of the most inventively gruesome murders you will ever see.  No kidding,  the sinister imagination in evidence here is amazing.  If you like giallo movies of this sort, I can highly recommend.  I’m glad I watched it but will not be doing so again.

Fan-made Trailer – better quality print and more representative of the film