Suspiria

Suspiria is a 1977 film by Dario Argento. It follows the story of an American ballet student named Suzy who attends a German dance school. She later discovers that the school is ran by witches.
We kick things off with Suzy arriving in Germany and catching a taxi at the airport. Right off the bat we see some really great lighting and colour. Suzy sits in the back seat, with the rain outside and a use of red and purple lighting, we get a fantastic look with the rain bouncing off the back window.
She arrives at the school but isn't allowed in. She does get to meet another student named Pat. Pat isn't in the best mood and runs out the door while shouting and screaming. I have to say that the acting here was a bit bad. She looked like she was running in a Penelope Pitstop cartoon.

Pat goes to a friends house and is attacked while in the bathroom. A hand crashes through the window after a good build up (it did succeed in making me jump) and pulls Pats face against the glass. Pat isn't having a good day but to make it worse, she then gets stabbed, has a noose wrapped round her and hanged after crashing through a large stained-glass ceiling. Her friend tries to help and she gets killed by the falling glass. The whole scene was well shot and again the lighting and colour looks brilliant, the stained-glass ceiling especially so. The blood too is a powerful shade of red.

Now they are out of the way, Suzy goes back to the school the next day and is allowed in this time. She meets teachers and students and strikes upon a conversation about the dead student from the night before. She overhears a conversation about Pat's murder and sticks her nose in about how she saw a student running away last night.
Suzy meets some other girls in the locker room. This scene is so full of sexual tension that if anymore was stuffed in to it, it would explode all over the room and leave a big sticky mess like an overly horny 14 year old boy watching this film. Infact, shorty after, Suzy meets a boy and there is supposed to be sexual tension between them but it's nowhere near as strong as with the other girls. You would have been mistaken for thinking you were watching some 70's soft porn if you hadn't been otherwise informed.

The next day Suzy meets the cook and an odd looking child. Nothing is said, just stares exchanged. Suzy then later collapses during a lesson, she wakes up in a dorm bed and is injected against her will. The doctor also tells her to drink a glass of wine a day for her blood. I want this guy as my GP.

As the girls all prepare for dinner, maggots drop from the ceiling. Maggots in hair and mouths. Maggots everywhere. The maggots look very realistic and the scene does have a very slimy and creepy feel to it. Everybody has to sleep in the practice hall while the maggots are cleaned up. We get some great lighting here. The staff sleep in another section from the students, cut off by what looks like hospital changing curtains. Shadows of the teachers are cast upon the curtains in a very stylistic, creeping manner.

I've come this far and i've mentioned the lights and colours a few times but i haven't talked about the music. The music is outstanding. The film would be a 6 or 7 out of 10, but the music takes it to a 9 or 10. It's beautifully spooky and hypnotic. It pushes you into a world of uncertainty and harsh tranquility. It may be the best soundtrack to any horror movie.

Daniel, the blind pianist is ordered to leave by Miss Tanner. His guide dog attacked the odd boy and Tanner is not pleased. On his way home we see some more fantastic light work as moving shadows cross the city walls around him. His dog turns on him and rips his throat out, leaving a stream of blood behind.

As the film comes to its climax, Suzy finds the witches hideout and finds them planning to kill her. Distraught, she finds her way in to another room and mistakenly awakens the head witch.
Sarah, the friend from earlier, what happened to her i hear you cry! Well she's dead. She fell in to a room of razor wire and had her throat slit. Do not fear, she is back, as undead Sarah. Before Sarah gets a chance to Kill Suzy, Suzy kills the head witch. This starts a chain reaction and the building begins to collapse. Suzy runs and escapes the school, leaving the witches to perish.

That is Suspiria. It's striking, eerie, suspenseful and bold. It leaves you with an indescribable aftertaste because you aren't sure how what seems like a slow build up managed to beat you so mercilessly. The music is perfect and the colour and lighting are like nothing else. A few moments of bad acting knock a point off, but besides that, it's a masterpiece.

The Shining

I've been thinking of writing about The Shining for a while now and seemed to put it off, the reason being that no amount of words can do justice to just how good The Shining is. It's a film you just have to see to fully understand how incredible it is. It's no secret that Stanley Kubrick is a brilliant director and The Shining is no exception to this but the true reason why to me, this film is so outstanding is Jack Nicholson.

Jack Nicholson is one of my very favourite actors. You could sell me on any film by telling me that he is in it. The Shining very well may be his greatest moment. His performance in this film is cemented in history, so much so infact that to a lot of people "Heeeere's Johnny!" is a quote from The Shining and poor old Johnny Carson doesn't get a look in. Fun Fact: The line was improvised by Nicholson.

The outline of the plot for those who have not seen it (if you haven't, you've never lived) is Jack takes a job as a caretaker for a hotel that closes over winter as so much snow blocks off access to the hotel. He and his family move in to the empty hotel for the winter. The hotel has a history of murders and the previous caretaker went insane and killed his family, which for some reason doesn't bother Jack at all. Danny, the young son, has a form of ESP called The Shining.
Jack wants to write a novel which doesn't go very well, mainly due to him going mad i suppose.
As time goes on Jack becomes increasingly irate and his wife becomes increasingly scared, wanting to take her son out of the hotel.
We also have a chef called Dick who too has The Shining, he able to talk to Danny through this and can feel he is in danger. This also doesn't end very well, but i won't spoil it.

The Shining has many iconic scenes including an elevator that opens to unleash a sea of blood, the twins in the hallway who one moment are alive and the next dead and soaked in blood and Danny on his cycle. These scenes and many more are iconic for a reason, they're so powerful. The music that accompanies the film is perfect, it creates an unsettling atmosphere from the very start of the film. Nothing has even happened and the music takes you to a place of fear, hanging over the viewer like a pendulum that can't be seen, yet you know it's there.
The use of children, while a cliche, works very well. The twin girls in matching clothing, always silent but always lingering leave a lasting impression from the moment you first see them with no explanation of who they are and without them doing anything.

The film also makes use of some great camera work. Danny rides about the hotel on his cycle and the camera follows him from behind, turning every corner with him. Is the camera something following him or is the camera what Danny can see ahead of him, the viewer waiting for the something to be stood waiting around every corner that we turn with Danny. I also enjoy the sound created by the cycle. No music is heard, just the sound of the bike and as he rides across wooden flooring, a loud bassy sound is heard, almost like a roar of a demon. As he runs over carpet it stops. He changes the two surfaces often creating a distinct and eerie noise.

Another of my favourite camera angles is Jack pressing the top of his head against a door with the camera under him. We get to see his face. Bright red with sweat running down it and his hair in a mess. He looks genuinely crazed.

I really can't begin to express how good The Shining is. Every twist and every scare is superb. The build of terror from the second it starts up to the second it ends is a ride of horror and delight. It should be a film everyone has to see before they die. If you have never seen it, i won't spoil it, but take some time out to see one of the best films of all time. Remember, all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre

After the 30's golden age, my favourite era of horror is the 70's. The 1970's revolutionised horror. It took horror away from vampires and mythical creatures and towards real life nightmares. Serial killers, maniacs with knifes and an unhinged mind. One of the very best of these is leather face from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

The title alone is superb. As a child i saw the name and my mind ran wild with thoughts of the horror that would be contained within that film. Made in 1974, nothing before it had really been so full on with terror. Tobe Hooper said he based it on real life serial killer Ed Gein. Gein would wear masks and create furniture out of human skin. With the birth of TV in every home and the news, people for the first time on a mass scale learnt of people like Gein and brought the terror of reality in to the public.

Hooper at the time was unknown and the film was independent, made with a low budget. This helped create the true feeling of reality. The film takes you in and gives you a feeling that this isn't a hollywood film with big stars that you know isn't real. None of the actors were known and the camera work at times makes it feel like a snuff film of sorts. Even without over the top blood (something i feel ruins modern day horror) it still shows horrific violence. My personal favorite scene is when we first see leatherface. Kirk wanders in to a house trying to find gas, from nowhere leatherface emurges and bludgeons him in the head. Instead of falling down dead with no movement, we see a real life like death. Kirk spasms on the floor with blood on his head. It really looks brutal. Leatherface quickly takes kirk in to his abattoir in panic. A simple man who doesn't understand where this man has come from. We also get a butcher hook impaling and a chainsaw to the chest throughout the ride of this movie.

The irony surrounding the film is the controversy it raised due to the violence within it. No doubt it was shocking for the time and not many films had such an all out rage to it. The irony is that the movie was Hoopers response to the violence of the real world, everything on the news such as riots and the Vietnam War. Hooper wanted to comment on the "lack of sentimentality and the brutality of things" being fed to the american public. The film was banned in many countries for its portrayal of pretend violence but no attempt has ever been made to ban the evening news.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a great film. It's the perfect balance between violence and suspense. It leaves you with an empty feeling of darkness. Even the girl that gets away is soaked in blood and she cannot forget the horror she saw and was subjected to and will take it with her for the rest of her life.