Suspiria (1977)

 I was very fortunate to have had my first viewing of 'Suspiria' on a big screen, because this is one of those movies that really benefits from it. There is so much going on, it is such a visual feast, boarding on overstimulating. I have never seen a movie that looks like this before, the vibrant colors, particularly red, the lighting, the sets, the use of shadow, the composition of the shots. 

The plot concerns an American ballet student (Jessica Harper) who travels to Germany to attend a prestigious ballet school, and quickly discovers that things are not what they seem. The screenplay was written for the central characters to be around 12, but due to the intensity of the horror images it was decided to cast twenty somethings playing girls in their late teens, but they didn't change the dialouge resulting in a rather off sense of immaturity. This combined with the heightened imagery, and the disjointed effect from the international cast all speaking dialouge in their own language overduebbed in post production (a common practice in European film production at the time), adds further surrealness to an already strange story concerning a string of suspicious deaths and other odd goings on.

Directed by Italian Dario Argento, 'Susperia' was his biggest hit in the United States, and not long into a directing streak of roughly 20 years of financial and critical successes. While technically a slasher film and rightly categorized as horror, it is actually part of a lose Italin film genra know as 'Giallo', murder mysteries, with strong physiological and/or sexual elements and often graphic violence. This film also boasts a strong and distinctive score by 'Goblin'. Not for all tastes, but a memorable experience. ****