Suspiria

That's it really.
The story is muddled and the dialogue is terrible but there are so many great things about the movie,as there are quite a few rubbish things..
To me it's one of the greatest examples of a nightmare being put to film.
It's a real pre 1980's movie that seems alien in the age of straight up horror flicks where little art or imagination is attached to the filming process.
Whether you like Argento's work or not (I too understand why many would not),the guy has to be highly applauded for using his own style and techinques.
 
I adore Dario Argento films, it's not my favourite, but still a classic film from him. The dubbing in his films doesn't help, films would be better with the Italian dialogue in most of his films(I believe the new Stendhal Syndrome release will have/has the original Italian track). My VHS version of his Deep Red goes back to the Italian original track in certain scenes.


Suspiria is getting a remake soon.
 
Mothers of Tears was horrendous. Unfortunately Argento is going further down hill. The Card Player was dull, Mother of Tears I've mentioned and Giallo was quite rubbish.

Shame.
 
25 years ago the next Argento film was a must.
I got Opera from Australia and Phenomena from Holland after all the UK BBFC problems but after Opera it all seemed to go wrong.

Everything that followed was a slow death for Argento.
I quite liked Sleepless and Stendahl had its moments but the rest are quite poor.

Have you seen Do You Like Hitchcock?
On par with Mother of Tears I think.

Still , with Deep Red finally appearing uncut in the UK we can relive Argentos best moments in HD.

Finally got round to getting Four Flies on Grey Velvet too but only on dvd.

I'm not really that keen to see Giallo but I guess I will.
Is it out on dvd anywhere ?
 
Figured you may but thought I'd mention it just in case :)
Cant blame you for having a crush on her at all. ;)

Guess I should add as im on this thread that I love Suspiria too. it's weird but wonderful
 
Giallo was passed by the bbfc today, so I'd guess it's coming out here soon: http://www.bbfc.co.uk/AVV273749

I was at what was apparently the first public screening of the film anywhere at the Edinburgh film festival last year. Nobody from the film turned up, which was seemed odd, until it played; the crowd just hated it, probably the most hostile crowd I've ever seen a film with. I thought it was enjoyable, but I like films that're so stupid they're entertaining, I'd suspect I'm in the minority in enjoying Giallo.
 
The Anchor Bay US dvd of Deep Red also retains certain scenes in Italian as they were cut before the English dubbing was done at time of release.

I saw Suspiria in 1982 on VHS and have kept a copy on VHS then LD then dvd ever since.

After 25 years of new horror movies its certainly not the thrillride it was back then.

But compare it to what the alternatives were in1977 when it was made and see how it stanRAB out.

The sequel Inferno was also excellent - not in terms of story but with the imagery it presented.

Both are light years ahead of most of Argentos subsequent films.

Only Tenebrae and Opera came close - most of the rest are very poor - but I still have them all in my collection including the Italian release of Stendhal Syndrome which has both Italian and English tracks.

Its important to remember that Argento used a mix of nationalities in many of his films so whichever version you see you will still get certain characters dubbed
 
The print Film4 used was an absolutely appalling disgrace - it looked like a pirate second or third generation copy VHS obtained from 'dodgy dave' at the local bootsale in the 1980s. Which is hardly going to help give first-time viewers a good impression.

If they'd used the best print in the world though it's still one of those films that, if things like acting and story are important to you, you're just not going to like it no matter what.
 
I wish I could tell you what the films like, but sadly I can't because I'm too distracted by how shoddily awful the picture quality is. :(
 
I personally love Suspiria but an see why others hate it. It does what it sets out to do though, it was conceived as a horror version of Snow White and was based on a Victorian account of a man's opium trip in which he met three witches who ruled the world from various locations. A cartoon-like trip is exactly what the movie is :D

But I think the problem with Argento movies (and all Italian horror for that matter) is the insistence to shoot in English, which resulted in terrible dialogue and terrible acting - much of what appears to be dubbing is dubbing of Italian-accented English with American or British English, not language dubbing. A good actor should be able to muddle through bad dialogue, but asking someone who doesn't speak English to speak bad English dialogue is a recipe for disaster - notice there's nothing wrong with Jessica Harper's scenes and she does well with what she has to say, for example.

Deep Red is Argento's best film largely because it's his most competent. The general consensus though is that it's Tenebrae, although that is let down by some terrible dialogue and acting (Anthony Franciosca and John Saxon are good though).

And he hasn't learnt yet either, his most recent film The Third Mother had all the same problems as Suspiria and Inferno.
 
Film4 seem to have a history of having problems with Argento films.

When they first showed some a few years back they showed Italian dubs even of the films he made in English.

Still cant beat the Suspiria Limited Edition 3 disc US dvd with DTS-ES 6.1 sound and a 25th Anniversary documentary thats never made it to the UK
 
There's no doubt that the style and soundtrack of Suspiria would have blown most people away in 1977 and for many years after that.

Its easy to see how modern audiences will be underwhelmed and believe it overrated compared to whats on offer today
 
The "dream" excuse is over used with Argento - especially with Inferno- its used to explain away bad acting ,intrusive dubbing,poor scripts and non existent plots.

But I still love Suspiria and Inferno
 
Suspiria was not shot in English.

As with other Argento films of the era they were shot with actors speaking in their own language and dubbing was done for each country later on.

Phenomena was Argentos first film entirely in English- but the problems you mention did appear in that film big time

Most of the original Italian versions of Argentos pre Suspiria movies have been on Film Four
 
No , I didn't know actually which is why I asked:rolleyes:

The next poster also thought perhaps you had got your films mixed up.

I have the Suspiria soundtrack cd and although I'm too old to have been interested when grunge was the in thing I just wondered if Goblin had got in early.
 
If you have that one why do you have Deep Red on VHS?

The US Anchor Bay dvd is great and has a short interview with Argento too
 
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