Suspiria (1977)

2 November 2020

Sat down and watched Suspiria again. Watching this I still think this is an excellent horror flick. Last time I mentioned the music and visuals, and I think that's even more important to me now that I've seen its remake. The colors in this movie are rich and vibrant, and when the horror is richly red and bloodied it's with a beautiful bold intensity. The music of Goblin isn't merely an eerie background, but sometimes it steps to the foreground, shouting "witch!" with a scene or fading out with the environment.

It's also a film that doesn't take itself too seriously. The drops of humor in the beginning make the latter horrors a greater contrast. The dialogue and exposition is at time horribly campy ("but, what does it *mean* to be a witch?"), and the plot/setting gets a little weird (why does a dance studio have a room for barbed wire?) but while bizarre it's also quite endearing, and makes for many memorable scenes.

I'd recommend this highly for similar reasons I recommend House (1977), except while House is more a bizarre fantasy than horror, I'd place this film solidly on the horror side of things - and for its time one of the more graphic films that has been made. And with a quick pace and short 100 minute runtime it holds up well, even today. 9/10

13 November 2016

Watched Suspiria (1977). I've owned this one a long time (I think I bought it when Borders was closing), but it's hard to get horror out to watch. I'd heard this is one of the quintessential horror films, and it's stunning for both its soundtrack and visual style. While it's not quite the skin-crawling horror film I expected, it's a solid horror film for its time, and feels like a foundation to where modern horror came from. I'll be interested in seeing its remake next year. 9/10