Homework Movie - Suspiria

I think the legend of Suspiria is much larger than the movie itself as a horror film. Looking at it today with more advanced FX technology and a wider perspective of the horror genre, there really isn't much to be terrified about in this movie. Directed by Dario Argento, it's rather campy nature makes it all the more entertaining and fun, more so than scary. A new student getting adjusted to dance school life and then the stories she's told perpetuate the myth of the school's infamy. As the story unfolds, Suzy Banyon, played by Jessica Harper finds out there's much more to her school than was in the brochure. Cat fights and gossip about other students is a pre-requisite and a tough head instructor a given. Creepy staff and the weird nephew are a different touch but don't hold much weight in scaring.

The atmospheric music by Goblin makes the movie suspenseful and moody, but the weird dubbing of the dialogue makes it a little choppy most of the time. Telling most of the story in exposition seems to be the norm from this generation of movie making, so this movie isn't alone in doing this. The staff and doctors outside of the school tell most of what is going to happen rather than showing the audience in a different cut that would have to be longer of this film.

Much to my dismay, this film doesn't live up to the reports of friends that have seen it before. I've given it more than one viewing before making this review. It has elements that would work in another film and it has things that I have seen in other movies, such as the students having something that ruins their rooms and then having to put up a makeshift living quarters in the Dance studio (Much like in Revenge of the Nerds) where all the girls are tossing and turning overnight and our subject/victim notices a strange visitor that plays a part later on in the story.

We watched several movies that had similar efforts for the time period they were filmed in. Cheesy dialogue, blood that was obvious it wasn't blood, and somewhat interesting soundtrack design. The stand out film from class was Dawn of the Dead, the sequel to Night of the Living Dead by horror master craftsman George A. Romero. He was given a place to stay with Suspiria's Argento to write the script for DoD, which he did in three weeks. Although not a masterpiece worthy of AFI top praises for best films ever, DoD does exemplify the genre and with it's comic book feel, doesn't diminish like Suspiria does, taking its story too seriously.

Homework Movie - A Bell From Hell (1973)

After seeing several different countries horror genre films as well as other genres from the 70's time period, I came to the conclusion that "A Bell from Hell" was a bit clunkier than it could have been for a horror film. The story involves a young man coming home to his family estate to get revenge for his imprisonment in an Insane Asylum. Some of the subplots don't help move the story along and feel unfulfilled to me.

The young man is played by Renaud Verley, who's a French native working in Spain on this and a few other productions. His character plays a few jokes on people during the course of the movie that don't feel like they belonged with this story. The only reason they're in the movie is to serve their purpose and they don't add anything. He enjoys a few prosthetic gags early on and has a life-sized model of himself sent to the house which later on someone believes is Juan (or John in the English dubbed version) and it's destroyed. It doesn't make any sense when Juan tries to save a young woman in a boat then not much else comes of it other than a bandaged Juan. Maybe it's to give his character an alibi, but it's unclear even after watching the movie a few times to pick up things I may have missed the first time.

Having a bell sent to the local church gives us the title of the movie, and it plays a very small part in the film. For a brief moment the bell doesn't ring when the church alter boys pull the rope. Not much else comes of it and even now, I never really got a clear reason for it not working.

A good deal of the camera work in the movie also doesn't help with the story. There's a lot of unnecessary shake in the camera, to me suggesting that it wasn't on stable ground when they shot. Those things could and should have been adjusted when they shot, not left in for the audience to be taken out of the film with.

About half way through the movie is when the real story begins to unfold. Juan starts to seduce one of his cousins which is disturbing at best, and begins a game of cat and mouse with the rest of the family to begin killing them. His home becomes sort of a petting zoo during dinner one night which is funny, but again it doesn't pay off anywhere else in the story, unless you count the bees used to kill his Aunt, which had no part of dinner.

One redeeming point to the movie is the way the girls get away from Juan in the end. They help each other out as one slips their bonds but doesn't leave the rest. All the while in the background of the place they are all staying at is running clips from the childhood of the five people.

Of all the clips we've watched this week and A Bell from Hell, I couldn't pick a really good movie out of the bunch. Alucarda had a good story with a little bit of blood (okay, a lot of blood) and some possessed people. The Black Pit of Dr. M has some funny moments that were supposed to be scary. Dr. M had a split in personality that seemed comical, not very scary. In all, this generation of import horror didn't terrorize more than it made me laugh. It would be the director, Claudio Guerin's last film, so he couldn't scare us any longer.

Homework Film - Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

I spent two hours being verbally abused and manhandled into submission by the likes of two very powerful performances by Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton as the long married Martha and George. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a look into married life, for those who haven't been married before.

A miscommunication leads this whole evening into the depths of marriage hell as we see husband and wife insulting, jabbing, and berating each other in front of unexpected company (at least the husband's expectations). In real life today, that marriage would have ended in divorce long before the movie took place. Having seen fights like this with couples I've known before, I'm surprised some of them are still together. Like in the movie, the couples that are still together have a strong dose of liquid courage some nights to "Brave" the course.

To my surprise, this was Mike Nichols' feature film debut, coming from television. His career has spanned four decades and is still going strong. Next up for him is an adaptation of Akira Kurosawa's High and Low from the 1960's.

In Class Movie - Rashomon

Watching Rashômon in class was a real treat. I wanted to watch another Akira Kurosawa movie for a while. Set mostly in the woods, Kurosawa used them as a backdrop for a domestic crime. Toshirô Mifune plays the Bandit, who becomes exuberant when asked what he did in the woods just three days earlier. Having to sort out the details from four points of view was an incredible experience. The bandit's story points him as a larger than life character trying to win Machiko Kyô's heart away from her husband. Her story places her as a horrible victim, and the late husband's story told through a medium explains a balance between the two previous stories. To paraphrase the scene with the commoners, "Why would a dead man tell lies?"

The truth came out in the final explanation of someone not directly involved. The wood cutter found the body, but wasn't part of the plot. His version shows the woman as a whore trying to leave her husband for the Bandit, and neither one wants her. She ends up calling them both cowards for not wanting to fight for her hand. They reluctantly did fight, but neither men wanted to.

I don't think the Bandit killed him. The wife looked most likely to have done the crime. Her sob story doesn't fool me. She wanted to leave him but under their beliefs they couldn't unless death.

Ultimately I think the woodcutter came out with the dagger in the end. He found the body and when he was explaining the story, he said there wasn't a dagger, but the husband was killed with a sword.

Mifune had a standing position in Kurosawa's films. He's done over half a dozen films with the director. They have worked on cultural adaptations of Hamlet and other novels.