Deep Red

Dario Argento is hands down the director that got me from watching regular Americanized horror movies and into watching foreign films. Argento was my gateway drug, so to speak. Suspria was the first one I saw. Deep Red was the second, and then I was hooked. Truly, seriously hooked.

Deep Red is a giallo, full of the traditional bright red blood, the over-the-top murders, and the beautiful art direction and use of color. The story this time around is a psychic is conducting a show and in the process ends up reading the mind of a murderer. David Hemmings witnesses her murder (the brutal, bloody kind of course), and ends up getting involved with Daria Nicoldi, playing the intrepid news hound, to help solve the murder. Whose mind did the psychic read? Who killed her? Will David and Daria figure out the true story and solve the crime without getting killed?

I love the brilliant color use here. You can tell Argento was looking towards Suspiria and it’s beautiful use of color. I also can’t help but love the Edward Hopper reference there at the beginning with the “blue bar” scene. The murders and the mystery are actually pretty good. The solution is hardly telegraphed throughout the movie at all. To top it off, you have a killer Goblin soundtrack. Man I love those guys.

Dario Argento really did some of his best work at this time. Deep Red is truly a classic.

Rating: 5 Purrs for one of my favorite films. Plus you gotta love a movie that was also named The Hatchet Murders.

The Mother of Tears: The Third Mother

For many, many years I waited in anxious anticipation to see the realization of a dream. Not the top of Mount Everest. Not the Aurora Borealis. Not the Grand Canyon (all though that was very cool). I waited for the completion of one of my favorite trilogies - the Three Mothers trilogy by Dario Argento. When I heard the day had finally come for him to make the final film in the trilogy, and it was going to star Asia Argento but also include a role for Daria Nicolodi, I just about wet my pants. I waited for Mother of Tears to come to theaters like most Star Wars geeks waited for Episode 1 (okay, I might have been one of those geeks too...but I didn't dress up). 

Mother of Tears starts off with the discovery of a mysterious box, sealed and chained to a coffin buried right outside of an old cemetery. The local priest sends it to the museum where Sarah Mandy and her colleague, Gisele, open the box to see what's inside. Kind of like Pandora, Sarah and her friend unleash hell on earth, with her friend getting the big old brunt of it right then and there. After narrowly escaping with her life, Sarah and her boyfriend, Michael, investigate. Who killed Gisele? Why are people going mad, committing great acts of violence in the streets, and committing suicide at an alarming rate? Who is the Mother of Tears and what does she want with Sarah Mandy?

I watched this DVD twice before writing this. When I first watched it, I was disappointed. Of course, I knew that I probably would be because most of Argento's recent work was just not what I loved in his early films. However, this first viewing was much more disappointing than I was expecting. So I knew I had to watch it again to really see what I liked and disliked, just to make sure I was seeing it for the film it was rather than the disappointment it was bound to be after so many long years of anticipation.

I warn you from here on there might be things I say that might spoil it for you - so beware.

First off, this movie is gory. I mean gory, gory, blood, guts, and gore. From the opening scene where Gisele bites it to the very end there are buckets of blood everywhere. And when I say blood, I mean blood, guts, maiming, eye gouging, self-mutilation, torture, and child death. It was downright disturbing the first time and didn't really seem any easier the second time around. The opening scene where Gisele gets killed involves her mouth being crushed with some sort of screwdriver thing, being sliced open, and strangled with her own guts. That's not the worst of it. I like gore. I like buckets of blood, but for some reason this time it just seemed like too much. Ugh. I did love the mouth thing with Gisele though. It looked way freaky.Plus the scene where Udo Keir bites it was just awesome. Chop chop, slice slice! Overall, all of this slice and dice reminds me of the images used opening credits (and others like them) - think Renaissance images of Hell. 

Second, this movie has its tense, suspenseful, and scary moments. When Sarah is returning to the room and hears Gisele being murdered, you do get  bit toward the edge of your seat, especially when the baboon starts stalking her. Baboons stalking anyone is scary. The building tension of Rome falling apart seems kind of silly at first but builds to a decent tension by the end. The scene in the train bookstore where the police detective is leaning right into her and not seeing her is well done. Honestly, though, the pacing seems a bit uneven to keep the tension and suspense going full on until the end. 

The acting in this movie is really varied; some of it is good and some of it borders on community theater. Asia Argento does a good job even though some of her lines are a bit silly ("don't leave me hanging," really?). The witches are just absurd - the gangs of witches roaming the train station act more like punk rockers out of a bad exploitation film or spoof  than spooky evil witches out of a horror film. Asia has much more chemistry with the guy playing the police detective (smoking hot police detective) than she does with the actor playing her boyfriend Michael. He's just awful. He overacts the part and just bumbles around. I think it's a major flaw because it is hard to stay "in the world" with him shouting and bumbling around. Udo Keir was awesome as always plus it was nice to see him again (he was also in Suspiria).  The actress playing the Mother really didn't have a whole lot to do other than stalk around naked, but the relish she shows when she is licking the tears off of a dying woman's face makes your skin crawl. Other than that, she is pretty sub par. (The brief appearance of Mater Lachrymarum in Inferno had more oomph to it than most of the scenes in this one - which spells bad news. The good thing is most of the other henchmen were creepy enough.)

What was missing - most of the atmosphere from the first two films in the trilogy. Suspiria had the psychedelic colors, and frantic editing, the spectacular death scenes. The whole movie felt like a dream. Inferno was more noir, and it had that awesome underwater room scene. Plus, you can't forget the amazing music by Goblin. It added such mood to the films. This time around there is only one scene with that kind of heavy color wash and most of the music is operatic. I miss the sound that Goblin gave the original. 

The ending just kind of fell flat for me. The final blood orgy scene just kind of felt, well, enh. I don't know what it was missing, but it was missing something. And the crawling through the pool of skeletons to get out just felt out of place (but very reminiscent of Phenomenon). Of course, the others had kind of wham, there's the end, endings too, so maybe that is par for the course. 

These first two movies were spooky. That's what made them so intriguing. This one seems to rely mostly on the gore without the spookiness. I miss the spookiness. 

Rating: 4 Purrs because I love the idea of the Argento family back together again but somehow the magic was missing this time. It's that ending. It's good and then enh. 

Susie, do you know anything about... witches?

My copy of Mother of Tears just arrived at Pandabob's office. Oh how I wish I were over there so I could rip the package open and watch it *right the hell now.*

HEY, INTERNET, STOP BEING SUCH CYNICAL EFFING DOUCHEBAGS BLOG-A-THON!

So one of my favorite blogs in the world to read is Final Girl, and she put the call out -

One day, and one day only: Tuesday, March 18.
You: write about something in the world of film that fills you with complete and total unbridled fucking retarded JOY.

So how can I ignore that? The problem I find is picking out just one thing to write about that fills me with stupid, toe-wiggling joy when it comes to movies. It's like someone asking me to pick just *one* favorite movie or just *one* favorite book. So to take the easy way out, I'll list a few joy inducing items here.

Movies I will watch anytime, anyplace, always, as many times as I can.

I have a few movies I will watch pretty much anytime they show up on my satellite. These movies are the ones I pull out of my DVD boxes most often. My husband groans every time one of these comes on because he's the type that will watch a movie once and be done with it. I'll watch JAWS anytime it's on TV. I'll watch it on DVD. I'll watch it edited and dubbed. When Roy Schneider sees the shark for the first time and says, "We're gonna need a bigger boat," I actually clap my hands with joy. I love the Die Hard trilogy (or quadrology now I suppose). "Now I know what a TV dinner feels like." Awesome. Anytime it's on TV. Halloween. Friday the 13th (I mean, hello - sexy vegetarian chick and creepy ass crazy Momma). Agatha Christie adaptations especially those with Peter Ustinov. (Those lead into my obsession with old people solve crimes media like Murder, She Wrote and Matlock.) The list goes on...

Italian Giallo

When I started college a friend introduced me to Dario Argento. I watched Suspiria and there was no turning back. Ever since NetFlix (another thing I love - access to movies I never would find on shelves at the Evil Empire) was founded and I joined I have watched every single Giallo I can find. I love the so very ultra-mod Seventies fashions, the badly filmed sex scenes, the mystery, the fake red blood, the overall silliness of them all.

Night of the Comet

If I had to pick just one movie. Just one to take with me on a deserted island with a TV and DVD player of course, it would be Night of the Comet. I anticipated the DVD release for this movie like Star Wars geeks foamed at the mouth for the new trilogy. Valley girls are the last people on earth after a comet wipes out the other folks in sunny CA. All that's left are these chicks and some zombies. "Daddy would have gotten us UZIs." Awesome. This is the movie I insist on people watching over and over. Plus - Zombies! Catherine Mary Stewart! UZIs! Shopping Malls!

Roger Corman Movies

Rock-n-Roll High School. Pirahna. Humanoids from the Deep. P.J. Soles. The Ramones. Riff Randall! Angry puppet fish! Lumberjack Man and his little blond daughter. Perky insurance investigators! Barbara Steele! Doug McClure! Slimy fish monsters impregnating women! The Alien-like fish birth! "Terror! Horror! Death! Film at Eleven."

My Current Favorite - Black Sheep

I read about this movie in Entertainment Weekly and saw "were-sheep." I said to myself, I must have this movie. I must see it now. And I finally did. Lamb jokes. Mint sauce, vegan animal rights activists. Special effects by the folks who did Lord of the Rings. Were-sheep.

"You hear that? Sounds like someone is sheering."

Oh man, I am smiling with joy just thinking about it. Black Sheep - It had me at "were-sheep."

I'll stop now cause I could go on. For hours. Just remember - were-sheep, angry puppet fish, feeling like a TV dinner, and those sexxxxy mod 7's fashions. Things that fill me with joy.

The Psychic

I loved the cover art on this DVD, but to be honest, I can’t figure out what in the world it has to do with the film. Nevertheless, The Psychic is a well-crafted Giallo by Lucio Fulci. It’s not in the top ten Giallos I have seen, but there are several twists and turns that make it worth a viewing.

In The Psychic, Jennifer O’Neill plays a newly married young woman who has just dropped off her husband at the airport for a business trip. On the way home, she is plagued by sudden visions of a woman being murdered. When she finally arrives at her husband's Italian villa, she recognizes the room where the visions took place, and when she breaks into a section of the wall, she discovers a skeleton. Her psychiatrist thinks the only thing to do is help her find the truth about who the person was and to clear her husband’s name, so a-investigating she goes with quite a bit of help from her shrink’s assistant. That girl seems to be able to find just about anything – think Wikipedia in human skin.

Overall this Giallo had no nudity and little gore, unlike most of the genre. However, there are some creepy scenes, including the chase through the old house onto the scaffolding. It’s a nice, clean little mystery that is heavily influenced by Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat. It’s not that it isn’t a good film; it’s just that others have been so much better.

Rating: 3 ½ purrs for a nicely crafted mystery and a creepy final 30 minutes

 

The Girl Who Knew Too Much

Mario Brava’s The Girl Who Knew Too Much is a well shot, spooky mystery with elements of Hitchcock and Agatha Christie. I enjoyed it more than I thought I would (I noticed it was in black & white and thought, oh, a silly horror movie. I was shamefully wrong.)

Nora is a young woman on vacation for the first time alone. She arrives in Rome to stay with her aunt, who is very ill. During her first night in Rome, Nora’s aunt dies, and a horrified Nora rushes out of the house to find help. The poor girl is mugged and while she fights for consciousness, she witnesses a murder on the plaza below. No one believes her, but a strange man seems to be following her everywhere. She moves into a flat on the plaza, the house of a new friend, and while house-sitting she finds information on the murder she witness, a killing by the serial killer of the Alphabet Murders. Will Nora solve the murder and figure out what she saw? Will the killer come after her? Will she be safe, and who can she trust?

Brava’s story here isn’t his masterpiece, but the film is well-shot with some beautiful parts of Rome pictured. There is even some light comedy here, i.e., the sometimes silly behavior of Nora trying to protect herself. I just loved the little traps she set. I wouldn’t say this is a must see for everyone, but if you like a nice, a little bit old-fashioned but beautifully shot mystery, check it out.

Rating: 4 Purrs for string!

Giallos: More Fun, More Kool-Aid

I simply cannot get enough of Giallo cinema. You would think that after watching as many as I have I would get tired of them, but somehow the flashy Italian fashions, the ultra-mod furniture, and the bright candy apple red fake blood just get me very time. Here are three Giallo films I watched recently. They aren’t Deep Red by any means (and really, how much really can be?), but they are good examples of the genre.

The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave

In this Giallo, a wealthy lord is having trouble getting over his wife’s death. He is obsessed with her as much as he was when she was alive and he was worried she was cheating on him. He tours the local bars, finding red-haired women to come back to his castle and fool around, where he later tortures and kills them. Later, his doctor friend convinces him to marry again, this time to a blonde, hoping it will help heal his slowly rotting mind. Of course, due to the nature of the Giallo, it really doesn’t help at all. There’s the gloved killer murdering women in gruesome ways, the creepy castle, the crazed lord who may or may not be killing people, and of course the beautiful women getting sliced and diced. It’s one of the better Giallos out there, once you move past the masters of the genre, and it’s well worth checking out.

The Red Queen Kills Seven Times

Two sisters have a past, with a secret tragedy and a horrible fairy tale that haunted their child hood. Even to this day, they remember the tale of the “Sisters in Red,” two murderous sisters will return on April 6, 1972 and continue their lethal behavior. So when the day arrives, they aren’t terribly surprised to have people around them dying, and a young woman in a red cloak being present at the scene of the murders. This Giallo was almost as good as The Night Evelyn Came Out of the Grave, in fact it makes a good double feature, and this once stars the very lovely Barbara Bouchet.

The Case of the Scorpion’s Tail

This Giallo is heavy on the mystery – a very rich businessman dies in a plane explosion, and his unfaithful wife is the beneficiary of 1 million dollars. The insurance company wants to investigate before they actually pay out the weeping widow, so an investigator arrives on the scene to determine if the widow had anything to do with the murder. A mysterious black-gloved murderer steals the money and leaves a trail of bloody bodies in his wake.

If you are a Dario Argento or Mario Brava fan but are looking for something more, maybe you haven’t seen these. Check them out. If you want to know what Giallo is, I would start with some others, like Deep Red or The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, and then, if you like those, move on to some of these Giallos.

Rating: 4 1/2 Purrs for nice Giallo cinema. Gotta love those titles and those very lovely pantsuits.