One of Argento's best, but still flawed

The Cat o' Nine Tails (1971)
Starring: Karl Malden, James Franciscus, and Catherine Spaak
Director: Dario Argento
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

A blind maker of crossword puzzles (Malden) overhears a suspicous conversation while walking home one night--and when the conversation appears to have been a precursor to murder, he teams with a young reporter (Franciscus) to uncover the truth.

"The Cat 'o Nine Tails" is perhaps the most underrated film that Dario Argento ever made, including by Dario Argento.

This isn't surprising since the film is short on many of Argento's trademark elements, such as characters seemingly forgetting facts they discovered two scenes earlier, the gore is limited as most of the onscreen deaths are strangulations and there are very little examples of sadistic and spectacular murders of women. Heck, the film is even a little more coherent than most of Argento's film. However, the film is still an Argento film, so that means a lack of focus in the story and that most of the characters are severely underdeveloped--in fact, the only character with any depth at all in this film is Karl Malden's blind puzzle-maker. The combination of missing elements that Argento fans look for and the presense of the things that most Argento fans hate about his films results in a movie that no one thinks is worthwhile.

And that is a shame, because the film is actually an above-average example of a1970s Italian murder mystery film. Compared to "Torso" or "The Case of the Bloody Iris", "5 Dolls for an August Moon" or other famous "giallo" pictures, it;'s a spectacular movie. It's plot is far more engaging, the characters and the actors portraying them are far more engaging, and the story, while unfocused and implausable, engages the viewers from the get-go and ever lets up until the very end. It is also peppered with visual flourishes that combine with a growing nightmare-like sense of dread and inevitable doom that will have you believing that the absolutely worst outcome imaginable is where things are heading.

"The Cat o' Nine Tails" is a stylish mystery film that has received a bad rap due to who directed it and what the expectations are from one of his movies. It's not perfect, but no matter what Argento might say in interviews, or what you might hear from fans and critics, it's a far sight better than the vast majority of the crap he has foisted upon movie-goers over the years.

Dario Argento's first film is one of his best films

The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (aka "The Gallery Murders" and "The Phantom Terror") (1970)
Starring: Tony Musante, Enrico Maria Salerno, Suzi Kendall, Eva Renzi, Renato Romano, and Umberto Raho
Director: Dario Argento
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

On the eve of returning home to the United States, an American writer in Rome (Mustante) witnesses a brutal attack on a young woman in a gallery (Renzi). The authorities insist he remain in Rome until they clear him as a possible suspect, as they believe the attack and in the meantime, he starts his own investigation. He witnessed the attack, but he feels there was something off with what he saw, but he just can't put his finger on what it was. Meanwhile, the serial killer continues to target young women, seemingly completely at random, and the writer and his beautiful girlfriend (Kendall) end up targeted for death as well.

"The Bird with the Crystal Plumage" was Dario Argento's first film as a director, and I think it is one of his most solid efforts. In fact, it is so solid that I had an even harder time deciding whether my write-up belongs here or with the Argento mystery films over at Watching the Detectives.

This film is, in many ways, a less bloody, more coherent version of "Deep Red," another of Argento's better efforts. Maybe of the same psychological themes are present in this one, including the one where the main character needs to recall something he saw at the scene of a violent crime but that didn't really register with his conscious mind. The conspiracies surrounding the murderer are also similar to one another, and both films "play fair" with the viewer insofar as the surprise twists and the "big reveal" of the killer's identity in both films is set up as the film progresses and the clues that lead to the solution are evident in retrospect. And while "Bird" and "Deep Red" both have characters behaving in unrealistic and stupid ways either for plot convenience or reasons that are only understood to Dario Argento, this film at least doesn't have gaping plot holes that he's trying pass off as red herrings.

More clearly showing Argento's debt to Alfred Hitchcock and Mario Bava than any of the films he made later (including his supposed tribute to Hitchcock that's more a love note to Argento himself in many ways), but also clearly a film coming from his own vision and sensibilities, it's a film that draws its tension as much from what you don't see as what you do see... there are sprays of blood but no outright gore, throats are cut but it happens off scene, and the pictures that will form in your imagination are far more horrible than what appears on screen. Its the intensity generated by the "less is more" approach in this film that caused me place it among his horror films instead of his mystery films.

That's not to say that there aren't great moments that Argento creates as well. The scene where our hero is locked between two automatic glass doors and has to watch helplessly as a knifed woman bleeds all over the floor of an art gallery; the sequence where he chased by an assassin through the deserted back streets of night-time Rome until he reaches a crowded area and then starts stalking the assassin; and some of the visual flourishes involving characters in pitch darkness silhouetted against a single source of sharp light, spring to mind as some of the most effective bits of filmmaking I've seen in any Argento picture.

Argento's "Susperia" had been presented to me as the best of his films. "Deep Red" had also been praised highly and come recommended by people I usually trust. However, I found both films to be deeply flawed, despite their admitted strong visual appeals, and after the more recent garbage he's made--"The Card Player" and "Do You Like Hitchcock?"--I was ready to give up on him completely. Then someone recommended I at least watch "Bird with the Crystal Plumage" and "Cat of Nine Tails" before turning my back on his work... and I'm glad I listened. Although not perfect, they are the best efforts I've seen from Argento yet. (And "Cat o' Nine Tails" will be get a write-up at Watching the Detectives eventually.)

I don't know what went wrong with Dario Argento as far as his skills as a filmmaker go, but he seems to have declined rather than get better as the years went by. Maybe his early films were as good as they are because he had to push himself to be the very best he could possible be, but that he got lazy once he was established and started to coast on his reputation. I wonder if that is what puts him apart from truly great filmmakers that he is compared to... they kept breaking their backs to deliver the best work possible even after they could coast on name value alone?

One of Argento's best still prompts the question, "That's it?"

Suspiria (1977)
Starring: Jessica Harper, Stefania Casini, and Joan Bennett
Director: Dario Argento
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

Suzy Banyon (Harper) comes to study at a prestigious German dance academy, but instead becomes drawn into the murderous and deadly web of secrets exists within its walls. Is there a killer on the loose in the school, or is it the spirit of its founder--a reported witch--who has returned from the depths of Hell?

When "Suspiria" was over, I mused out loud, "Was that it?"

The film is praised by critics and viewers as being Argento's best, but I think "Deep Red" is a far superior film. The only things "Suspiria" has going for it are some fantastic sets, some interesting lighting, a neat theme by Goblin, and the attractive Jessica Harper's deer-in-the-headlights performance.

Everything else is "Suspira" is sorely lacking. The structure of the dance classes shown are odd and unrealistic, the acting is mostly wooden, and the script is so weak so as to feel like an excuse to simply display the three set-piece murder scenes. To make matters worse, what story their is only succeeds due to Stupid Character Syndrome, except here it's the villains that engage in such mindless stupidity that one wonders how they managed to the school's secrets for as long as they did.

There are countless really cool cinematic moments in the film (prime among them are Suzy's trip through the rainstorm at the beginning of the film, the climactic moments of the first murder, the sequence in the open plaza, the entire sequence of Sara's flight through the school, and Suzy's exploration during the film's climax), but the story that should be motivating all these scenes is so ill defined and poorly explained that it makes an already weak climax feel rushed and as if the movie ends before we're even given one-quarter of the story.

Impressive visually, but severely lacking in the story department, "Suspiria" isn't as good as its repuation might lead you to believe. I think it's worth seeing if your interested in seeing a technically well-done film, but you can spend your time better if you're just interested in watching a creep-fest.

Great proto-slasher flick, despite sloppy writing

Deep Red (aka "The Deep Red Hatchet Murders" and "The Hatchet Murders")(1975)
Starring: David Hemmings, Daria Nicolodi, and Gabriele Lavia
Director: Dario Argento
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

Pianist Marcus Daly (Hemmings) witnesses the brutal murder of a famous psychic, and then teams up with Gianna Brezzi, a feisty woman reporter (Nicolodi) to find the killer. Soon, they find themselves stalked by the deadly, seemingly omnicient murderer who is willing to end numerous lives to protect a number of dark secrets.


"Deep Red" is a detective thriller crossed with a slasher flick (and it's definately one of the precursor films to the slasher genre), with hints of a ghost movie tossed in for good measure. Although it's easy for a movie with so many different genre elements all simmering in the same pot to dissolve into a hideous, gooey mass, director and co-writer Argento manages to stir the many elements into a fabulous goulash of gore, mystery, and plot-twists that are actually suprising to the viewer.

This is far from a perfect movie. It's got some pacing problems--any viewer paying attention will know that a character who is pegged as the killer at one point in the film can't possibly be the killer, and Marcus should realize it too long before he does--and the storyline is unneccesarily muddy at a couple of points, but there are enough chills, gory kills, and well-executed twists to more than make up for these weaknesses. (The thread of Marcus trying to remember some half-seen clue at the crime scene, one that he thinks might unlock the entire mystery, is a great device that keeps the viewer engaged... and the kills scenes will sate any gore-hounds out there.)