I’ll start out by saying that I knew relatively
little about Dario Argento’s Suspiria going into it for the first time. I knew it had a fairly
respectable reputation and a famous scene involving a stained glass ceiling. I had vague memories of the
segment about it on Bravo’s 100 Scariest Movie Moments, and though I watched that series
annually for about three years in high school, I didn’t remember any plot details about Suspiria
specifically. But it was these vague memories of the clips of the glass ceiling scene that drew me
to the film. And it wasn’t anything to do with the scare that came with this bloody beaten woman
falling through a ceiling only to be caught by a noose before she hits the ground. It was a
frightening image, but if the show provided any context for the woman’s death, I didn’t recall
it. What intrigued me and what stuck with me were the visuals that complemented this death
scene: the bright reds and shapes on the walls, the layout of the building, the design of the
stained glass and the floor. When watching its segment of the Bravo series, which was
essentially a marathon viewing of famous death scenes, it stood out so much among even the most
iconic horror films. After seeing the film in its entirety, I look back on this and find it pretty
amazing that so much about the film as a whole was communicated from watching literally seconds of
the film and from a scene that ultimately plays only a minor part in the narrative.
The film begins with the arrival of main character
Suzy Banyon at her new German ballet school, but for whatever reason she cannot be let in
the building. As she is arrives, a woman runs out the door, yells something she can’t understand
and runs into the night. The film then switches to this woman, Pat, still shaken from whatever was at
the school, at her friend’s apartment. When she is alone in the room, she sees a pair of eyes
outside and suddenly she is attacked, stabbed and disemboweled. Her body falls through the glass
ceiling of the building, catching on a noose before she hits the ground, with the falling glass
and debris also killing her friend. The film then returns to Suzy, getting settled in at the ballet
school. The school is filled with strange characters, but seems normal initially. But strange things begin
happening: Suzy suddenly becomes ill after an encounter with one of the staff, maggots infest
the building and the school’s blind piano player’s seeing-eye dog mauls and kills him. Along
the way, Suzy befriends a classmate, Sarah, who was friends with Pat and has some theories as to
these happenings. Sarah tries to tell them to Suzy, but before she can she is murdered by
presumably the same assailant as Pat while Suzy is asleep. Suzy is told that Sarah left in the night,
but she looks into a man Sarah had mentioned before she leaves. This man explains to her that the
school was founded by a woman interested in the occult, famously thought to be a witch and the
school thought to be run by a coven of witches. Returning to the school, Suzy finds a secret
section of the school, based on what she remembered Pat yelling as she left and discovers
that, surprise, the staff is witches. She confronts the founder of the school, who tries to kill her, but
Suzy ultimately triumphs and walks away as the school burns down.
The narrative is certainly distinctly horror, but
many elements of the genre come and go to contribute to the film to the films nature of horror.
Initially, the films makes the viewer believe this will be a stalker-murderer story with its first
killing, then later reaffirms this with Sarah’s death scene. But once Suzy settles into the school,
the scares come more from the idea of the school as a haunted house, until finally settling on
a more supernatural horror story with the introduction of the idea of witches. But though some
narrative elements may be too familiar, the way Argento uses them in tandem with certain
directorial techniques to get the scares is rather unique. Initially, I was slightly off put by the way
Argento handled the tension and release of the killings that the success and effectiveness of
the horror genre so depend on, but in retrospect there’s a certain unique genius to it. The score of
the film, by Italian progressive rock band Goblin, is a constant presence, as any score should
be, but is a loud symphony of many noises and instruments that could almost be described as
cacophonous. At the tense moments before a killing in the film, the score builds and builds only
to completely stop before anything happens, leading the viewer into a something in between a
false sense of security and disappointment at the lack of catharsis. But it is shortly after this
when the killing finally happens and often in an unexpected fashion. The way the viewer braces for
some monster or supernatural force to take out the blind man in the square, but jumps when it is
the man’s dog that bites his neck or how we think Suzy as escaped the killer through the window,
only to have her fall into a sea of barbed wire.
But although the film excels in providing a horror
story and frightening moments, what drives and ultimately defines the film are the visuals and
Argento’s directing in general. Any horror film can be said to be a nightmare brought to life,
but with Suspiria, Argento immerses the viewer in an environment so surreal and frightening
“nightmare” is the only descriptor that will do it justice. The unnatural lighting of blue
and red and extravagantly designed rooms and hallways of the school provide the viewer with a
consistent visual aesthetic, but one that keeps them consistently on edge and unsettled. Certain
physical spaces are established, but the viewer never really has an idea of the layout of the school
that the majority of the film the school takes place in, causing a jarring effect when the
characters wander. As I mentioned previously, parts of the narrative are somewhat problematic. Characters
and ideas are introduced but never really developed in the story as a whole and the
inconsistency of the horror elements used is interesting but strange. But ultimately these aspects lend
themselves to the dream-like nature of the film, making the school seem like some unique realm where
strange things happen with little or no explanation. What drew me to the film was the
beautiful and strange imagery, the likes of which I had never before seen. What the film as a
whole provides is a nightmarish vision and an approach to horror that is just as equally unique.
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