Suspiria / **** ½

It’s taken me a long time to come around on Suspiria. The first time I saw it, probably 15+ years ago, I saw it knowing only that it was hailed as an essential and classic horror movie. What I got was bewildering to me; stylish and colorful, sure, but also nonsensical, unclear, and just sort of a mess. Then, a few years ago, I decided to give it another shot, seeing it on the big screen, to see if maybe I just had a bad first experience…but this time, a butchered and neutered print left me even colder to it, not really understanding any of the appeal of the film. To me, Suspiria’s popularity was bewildering; the script was a mess, the sequences often incomprehensible, the acting off-kilter…I just couldn’t get it.

But over the past couple of years, I’ve finally started to understand Italian horror – the style, the emphasis of mood and mise-en-scene over story, the focus on surreal and nightmarish imagery more than script or acting. It started for me with Lucio Fulci films, but there have been others along the way, including some more exposure to Argento. And so, I decided it was time to revisit Suspiria one more time, if I could find the right chance. So when the Belcourt theater in Nashville announced that they’d be screening the new 4k, uncut restoration of the film on the big screen, it seemed like the perfect chance.

And, man, am I ever glad I went.

There’s no denying that being more attuned to the rhythms of Italian horror had a huge impact on my viewing this time, as did realizing exactly how much – and how little – story I was going to get with Suspiria. Because, make no mistake, this is a thin, thin movie, in which a ballerina attends a school run by witches, and creepy things happen. That’s about all there is to Suspiria in terms of plotting, and yet, seeing the film in its full, uncut, restored glory, it’s hard not to get swept up in the nightmarish, intense setpieces. From a haunting pursuit that ends with creative use of a stained glass window to a blind man being attacked by his own guide dog, Suspiria shows off Argento’s knack for staging a sequence, and if it doesn’t always stand on the logic of the film or entirely make sense of its own accord, well, you’re certainly not thinking about that while you’re watching it.

But more than that, the colors – my god, the colors. Seeing Suspiria not just in a pristine  restoration, but in a restoration that made every single super-saturated color nearly pop out of the screen…well, it was a jaw-dropping way to see the film, one that frequently left me speechless at the imagery on display. It’s the ideal way to see – and to appreciate – Suspiria, a film that almost entirely relies on its ability to sweep you up in its saturated, hypnotic, strange world. (Mind you, the iconic score by Goblin does no small amount of work here, creating a strange, off-kilter mood that’s impossible to shake. It’s a bizarre, atypical score for a bizarre, atypical movie, but man, do they ever work well together.)

There are always going to be things about Suspiria that just don’t work for me. Even knowing how loose and shaggy the story is, there are big chunks of the movie that just feel silly and nonsensical, stretching the already tolerant boundaries of Italian horror to their breaking points. That’s probably most true in the film’s climax, a truly jumbled set of moments that feel like nothing so much as the film running out of time and hurriedly wrapping itself up so it could beat traffic. And even with the unbelievable style on display, part of me prefers the sleazy, go-for-broke horror of Fulci to Argento’s controlled, beautiful death.

But for the first time, this screening helped me understand what everyone loves about Suspiria.  It left me in awe of the iconic death sequences, unsettled by some of the intense mood setting, and absolutely floored by the beauty of the compositions. And more than that, it finally helped the film fall into focus not just as a niche art thing, but as a unique and fascinating piece of horror unlike most anything else. It’s beautifully, intricately composed, worried entirely about its visuals over its story (and even its scares), and absolutely, carefully controlled in its craft. And as someone who so often loves horror but finds the craft lacking, that’s no small thing.

IMDb