Dario Argento and others thrillers/horror movies directors

[cthulhu]

damn, that sucks! no chance to change plans and go together with your dad to the carpenter gig?

[Master Ray]

damn, that sucks! no chance to change plans and go together with your dad to the carpenter gig?

Lovely thought, but I doubt that (a) my Dad would be into a live rendition of theme tunes that for the most part he's never heard and (b) seeing as it's reuniting him with his very best mate that he hasn't seen since, I think, the 80's (something I put in place with help from another Forum regular here), in a town we loved during many visits in my childhood (first time in nearly 30 years together!), I think that the latter option has to take precedence.   

Not the first disappointment I've had this month.  Planned a big London trip around seeing Killing Joke there, but didn't get around to buying a ticket and now it's sold out...   

[cthulhu]

what a blast! i had worked for ten days in a row, and on my first day off the door bell rang in the morning and i got my delivery of "suspiria".
what a good start! so i wandered around, went shopping, cleaned a little bit my flat, a little bit and just waited for the sun to go down, to watch suspiria in the evening. i could have made my place dark, but that isn't the same. you have to watch suspiria in the evening or at night.

and the work they have done in preserving and restoring that movie is so impressive and marvellous. every image is so clean and vibrant and steady and the colours are fantastic. argento and his dop were determined to get the colours bright and heavy and they used a special film stock and a different colouring process than usual, technicolor dye transfer process instead of eastman process.
there's a very informative booklette about this restoration work and a 1hour documentary about it, with comparisons of the old original frames and all the problems that they had. the biggest one, that no intact master copy of the movie was found and they had to use different reels of different generations.

then there was the problem with the sound, also a long story, they couldn't get a copy on magnet audio tracks but then found a good mix made in the 80s for a laserdisc release. and the sound is so good now in stereo!

i'm thrilled to have seen such a masterpiece of filmmaking and at the same time such dedication of people who worked so hard to preserve that movie.

[Master Ray]

Sounds awesome, dude.   

[Guillaume]

The camerawork, production design, cinematography and Jessica Harper are just incredible in that movie...unforgettable.

argento and his dop were determined to get the colours bright and heavy and they used a special film stock and a different colouring process than usual, technicolor dye transfer process instead of eastman process.

It was the last movie using Technicolor stock, indeed! That's why the colours are so vivid fantastic and unique...i would like someday to see "Suspiria" on the big screen, in 35mm.  "Inferno" is an incredibly beautiful looking movie too, but his colours are less "agressive", softer than the ones seen in "Suspiria".

[Guillaume]

Dario's tribute to Lucio Fulci, in 1996:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DrhDWvlCSc

[Guillaume]

Seen yesterday "Suspiria" the remake...i wasn't really convinced, the screenplay is bloated, messy, the pace is too slow and the gory finale is silly and clumsily made. All the historical background is heavy handed and even questionable (the 2nd WW references), sometimes i asked myself what was the real point of the story...what i liked: the two dance scenes are quite good and the casting is ok even if the actresses don't have much to do with their characters.
A kind of ambitious/pretentious remake but mostly "meh" and boring...of course the Dario Argento movie is very different and far more involving.

[Master Ray]

I've been hearing much the same, but I'll give it a go, can't do it this weekend but I've got a few days off, I'll be back to report on it.

And, as a sidenote (to a comment you've all probably forgotten), I did manage to get tickets for Killing Joke in London tomorrow so yay!   

[Master Ray]

And here's Mark Kermodes review of 'Suspiria'...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3pDHxnZucg

[Guillaume]

I must say the 10/15 first minutes of the movie are quite intriguing, because it's so different from the Dario Argento movie, visuals and mood...i like the music on the opening credits and song on the end credits, it's quite haunting and melancholy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTZl9KMjbrU

The screenplay is what mostly "kills" the movie...it probably has ambition but it leads nowhere, like if many of the scenes have been cut (and the film is already long...)...the screenplay of Dario's movie was simple, basic fairy tale and it worked really well, you were really in Jessica Harper's shoes and skin, through her haunting journey, you felt for her.

Here you have too much characters (Dakota Johnson isn't bad but her presence is far less striking than Jessica Harper's eyes in the original movie), they aren't especially fleshed out and the historical/political background doesn't connect with the rest of the story. The two dance scenes are quite beautiful, i would have liked more of them. 

I've been hearing much the same, but I'll give it a go, can't do it this weekend but I've got a few days off, I'll be back to report on it.

I can't wait to read your opinion about the film but hurry up because here in France the early box office numbers are disastrous, maybe it is going to be the same case in UK?

[Whirlwind]

I just watched an exceptionally weird, creepy horror film the other night. Any of you ever see this 1972 British horror film called DEATH LINE aka RAW MEAT?





See, there was a cave-in back in the 1800s and the decendents of that cave-in 100 years later are eating the passengers of London's underground! The film probably has cult status amongst horror fans and I can see why. It's a blast.

But it isn't the creepy horror that makes this film a blast to watch. It is Donald Pleasence and his amazingly sarcastic performance as a Police Inspector. Oh, man, why didn't Carpenter let Pleasence do in HALLOWEEN what he does in DEATH LINE? Pleasence is dead drab in HALLOWEEN, but full of wild life in DEATH LINE. I could praise Pleasence's performance forever, but this review on IMDB says it best.

"Sarcasm is the reason to watch DEATH LINE. The flabbergasting and versatile displays of sarcasm shown by Donald Pleasence's copper Calhoun are simply breathtaking. The British policeman, as is well known, has about 52 forms of sarcasm at his disposal, to make up for his not carrying a sidearm, and Pleasence uses them ALL, shifting from one to another with lightning speed. Observe a master at work. Pleasence and Rossington apparently ad-libbed many of their best lines, resulting in free and easy and extremely funny series of scenes between the two."

Yes, Pleasence and the actor who played The Beatles' manager in A HARD DAY'S NIGHT are the best duo ever to appear together on screen! They should have gotten a variety TV show based upon their chemistry in DEATH LINE.

See this film. 85 minutes of wild lunacy (and just wait till you hear the weird electronic score that only a mental patient would submit).

[Master Ray]

I must say the 10/15 first minutes of the movie are quite intriguing, because it's so different from the Dario Argento movie, visuals and mood...i like the music on the opening credits and song on the end credits, it's quite haunting and melancholy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTZl9KMjbrU

The screenplay is what mostly "kills" the movie...it probably has ambition but it leads nowhere, like if many of the scenes have been cut (and the film is already long...)...the screenplay of Dario's movie was simple, basic fairy tale and it worked really well, you were really in Jessica Harper's shoes and skin, through her haunting journey, you felt for her.

Here you have too much characters (Dakota Johnson isn't bad but her presence is far less striking than Jessica Harper's eyes in the original movie), they aren't especially fleshed out and the historical/political background doesn't connect with the rest of the story. The two dance scenes are quite beautiful, i would have liked more of them. 

I've been hearing much the same, but I'll give it a go, can't do it this weekend but I've got a few days off, I'll be back to report on it.

I can't wait to read your opinion about the film but hurry up because here in France the early box office numbers are disastrous, maybe it is going to be the same case in UK?

Very few showings in the UK.  If I can make it over to Manchester tomorrow afternoon I might be able to make a showing (at HOME, a Manchester cinema that shows 'unusual releases')  but I've got other stuff to do that's more important... this one hasn't been given a wide release, seems to be an arthouse thing in the UK.  So, nope, no big money coming in from the UK.

[Guillaume]

I just watched an exceptionally weird, creepy horror film the other night. Any of you ever see this 1972 British horror film called DEATH LINE aka RAW MEAT?
The film probably has cult status amongst horror fans and I can see why. It's a blast.

But it isn't the creepy horror that makes this film a blast to watch. It is Donald Pleasence and his amazingly sarcastic performance as a Police Inspector. Oh, man, why didn't Carpenter let Pleasence do in HALLOWEEN what he does in DEATH LINE? Pleasence is dead drab in HALLOWEEN, but full of wild life in DEATH LINE. I could praise Pleasence's performance forever, but this review on IMDB says it best.

See this film. 85 minutes of wild lunacy (and just wait till you hear the weird electronic score that only a mental patient would submit).

MIND THE DOORS! 

I like this film very much too, it's funny, bleak and has tragic social undertones too...i mean the poor "killer" in it is pathetic, the scene where he is near his wife's dead body is gruesome...tragic...i also LOVE the looong single shot through the underground, with the sound of the drop of water, if i remember well. It was a very influential movie, think of "Creep" or even the first "Texas Chainsaw"...the director Gary Sherman directed two others brillant movies at least, "Dead and buried" and "Vice squad".
And yes, Donald Pleasance is great in this film, so funny...but i like him in "Halloween" too (by the way, i watched for the first time on the big screen "Halloween" on...last Halloween!...and it was a blast in cinema, enjoying it with an audience...awesome film on the big screen and one of Carpenter's very best)!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNkDrFdFylY

Don't you think that this track and opening credits are great? 



 

Very few showings in the UK. this one hasn't been given a wide release, seems to be an arthouse thing in the UK.  So, nope, no big money coming in from the UK.

Ok...in France it has been released on its first week over 140 screens/theaters, so not bad, ok release, but only 25 000 tickets have been sold during this opening week...not good at all, these numbers..

[Master Ray]

Didn't make it to Manchester and I can't find any other screenings, so I guess I'll be seeing it on my TV when it eventually shows up somewhere...

[Guillaume]

The Company Of Wolves (1984) - Is it horror or is it arthouse?  Don't care, love this film!

I've seen it on BR a few weeks ago, it's wonderful...beautiful looking, haunting.
Neil Jordan is an underrated director, i really like too "Ondine", "Byzantium", "End of an affair", "Interview with a vampire", "The crying game", even "High spirits" was a fun, charming little movie.