Putty Up

Let's get this out of the way: I like--not love--Dario Argento.

I understand and appreciate his contribution to genre cinema. Suspiria is something of a masterpiece. His support and connections helped make Dawn of the Dead be all that it could be. I’ll admit that I’ve yet to see some of his more respected early efforts (Deep Red, The Bird With the Crystal Plumage, Four Flies On Grey Velvet among them) but regarding his middle-career streak (Tenebre/Phenomena/Opera), I come up in a rather scandalous category of meh.

Maybe I should just wait to reserve any complete judgment until I see his long-awaited Dracula 3D. Word on the street is it’s a hit!

Quick Plot: A young model named Celine is abducted by a yellow tinted mad man with a thing for disfiguring and killing beautiful women. Luckily for his latest soon-to-be victim, Celine's sassy flight attendant sister Linda will stop at nothing to save her. For Linda, that mostly means tracking down Adrien Brody's tortured Inspector Avolfi to crack the case before it's too late.

Giallo is, I guess, a giallo, save for the fact that doesn't really tease you with a mystery to the killer's identity. 

Well, maybe it does?

See, for some sort of creative/silly/yet sort of entertaining reason, Brody does double duty as the earnest hero and mumbling murderer. Now anyone who's ever caught a glimpse of Adrien Brody only to feel as though his one-of-a-kind schnozz has poked them in the eye might be wondering 'How can you possibly disguise a man with a face as singular as Adrien Brody?'

Well...

I'll spoil a question that you might otherwise be distracted asking for Giallo's 90 minute runtime: no,  Putty Brody is not the secret long-lost twin of Non-Putty Brody. Nor is Putty Brody supposed to be Non-Putty Brody in a putty disguise. Nope. He's just playing two parts a la Paul Dano in There Will Be Blood or Frank Morgan in The Wizard of Oz. 

Except with about 85% more putty.

You’re probably now thinking “how can you possibly get back to a semi-serious discussion of this movie when all I can think about no wis putty?” I feel your pain. And answer simply with this:

You can't.

High Points

Dummy violence! It's a giallo and it has dummy violence! THAT'S A GOOD THING!

Low Points

So. That was an note of ambiguous hope to end on eh?

Lessons Learned

Italian policemen were never taught how to take a pulse

The more puttied your face is, the further back your memory goes. This calculation does indeed lead to the conclusion that if your face is made entirely of putty, you can remember your life in your heroin addicted mother's womb

When considering what to be when you grow up, remember a hidden bonus of the occupation 'fashion model': you'll probably be skinny enough to squeeze through a chained door when trying to escape a mad putty-faced serial killer

Perhaps it explains my clumsiness as something blood-related: Italians are not very good at walking, at least if it involves passing another person without crashing into them

Randomly Aggressive Product Placement

Because watching a movie about a man who slaughters pretty young women ALWAYS puts me in the right mood for snappy Diablo Cody dialog

Rent/Bury/Buy

Look, I'm not calling Giallo a good movie. But unlike a lot of other gialli, it didn’t bore me. Many diehard Argento fans will call it a true shame, but as someone who’s never been overly impressed by the filmmaker’s output, I don’t see it as being THAT bad. It’s more that he never quite improved from where his run ended in the mid-80s. Fog up Giallo to make it look like it was made in 1987 and try to tell me it’s that much worse than Opera. 

Or just don’t watch it and save yourself an argument. The choice is ultimately yours.

Kissy kissy.

Travel Tuesday

It's here...

A whole hour on the new greatest film of all time. GleeKast cohostess Erica and I detail the plot, music, styling, and Cher-induced crying of a former Goonies star directed masterpiece, Burlesque. Get it on the iTunes feed for GleeKast, or stream here: http://gleekast.podomatic.com


And be sure to dress like a whore when you do!


Also in the world, I stopped by the Gentlemen's Blog to Midnite Cinema to review the late Irvin Kershner directed, Mommie Dearest starring Eyes of Laura Mars. Though I didn't love the film, I did find the chance to reference the following:


AMC Pacers
Tenebrae
America's Next Top Model
Showgirls

All of which, when mixed, tastes like the lips of Brad Dourif

And that my friends, tastes goooooooood.

Reader Recommendation: Tenebrae

“Eschewing any in depth analysis or over-enthusiasm for something I personally like a lot, I'll try and just give you one quick reason to see one of the movies on your list. When you reviewed a movie and said that it contained a death by dodgeball scene in it, I wanted to see that movie. That's the kind of recommendation I would like to pass on. That said, my recommendation to you is "Tenebrae," and it's for this reason only: it's got some pretty damn impressive stunt work performed by a Doberman Pinscher. That doesn't sound so alluring now that I've written it, but it's like nothing I've ever seen before.”--Dave 

“You should watch tenebre because I won't read your blog again until you have!”

--Myke

Having finally watched one of the seminal films of Italian horror, I can honestly tell you what I will take from it most prominently is...

Doberman Pinschers are indeed capable of doing incredible stunt work.

Quick Plot: Horror/mystery novelist Paul Neal heads to Rome for his book tour just as a psychotic slasher begins murdering beautiful brunettes in the style of his pages. A fanboy detective investigates while Neal, his assistant, and driver play Encyclopedia Brown on their own time.

Talking about Tenebrae in the horror community is the equivalent of discussing Citizen Kane at the Producers Guild or Guinness at an Irish pub. It is, to my understanding, the definitive giallo film, one of Argento's crowning achievements, and, for some, the best Italian horror film of all time.

For. Some.

Sigh. 

I can't gush over Tenebrae. I can say, in utter honesty, that I found it be an interesting watch from a film-ish point of view. As an experience, however, it never felt...well...effective.

I'm going to divide this review into two parts: the simple sit-down-to-a-movie fan and the intellectual meta-watcher. Here goes:

Couch Potato

Though visually interesting, Tenebrae just isn't that suspenseful from my 21st century sensibilities. It's hard to be emotionally involved in a character's fate when synthesized music blasts through the television to tell me said character is being stalked. It's hard to care about a mystery that seems so calculatedly mysterious on the part of the writer. It's hard to be scared by a film that wears its style on every frame.

At the same time, Tenebrae grew on me strong enough that I was intellectually, if never emotionally invested in its outcome. It’s impossible to not TRY to solve the mystery, even though the film spends just about every minute making it impossibly improbable to crack. The climax is sufficiently brutal (yet still pretty unbelievable) so you’re left satisfied enough.

Intellectual Movie Watcher

One needs to read a little bit about Tenebrae in order to get why it figures so prominently on best-of lists in cinema studies. I did this after watching the movie.

And so yes. I get that the extraordinary movement of the camera, superbly executed crane shots, and meta nature of Peter Neal’s relationship to Dario Argento. It’s there onscreen to be sure, and when analyzed, very impressive. The visuals are superb. The red is very red. There are books to be written (and recommended) and long conversations to be had. It's an important movie to be discussed. I just didn't really like it enough upon first viewing to do it right now.

High Points

I’m always for daytime horror, and one thing I genuinely admire about Tenebrae is how well Argento uses sunniness and full lighting to show us everything

Low Points

I know Goblin and Argento are as complimentary as peanut butter and banana, but really, how scared can I as an audience member be when the soundtrack just makes me want to put on a pair of jogging shorts and a headband and do a few laps?

Lessons Learned

The best way to get a girl in bed probably does not involve telling her you might throw up

When your driver is clearly mentally unstable after witnessing a horrific murder, it’s a good idea to buckle your seatbelt

Those ‘keep your bag in your view at all times’ airport rules aren’t just useful for terrorism

There really is a reason for modern art!

Stray Observation

Two characters do things I can’t: the aforementioned dog climbs a fence and John Saxon demonstrates how to bow and dance without losing a snazzy hat. Both make me feel insanely jealous and inadequate

Rent/Bury/Buy

Considering its pedigree, all genre fans should see Tenebrae at some point in their lives. I would recommend reading up on why it’s so important before watching, something you could do quite rewardingly with blogger extraordinaire James Gracey’s book . I’m sort of stepping away from calling Tenebrae good or bad, great or dull. It’s essential viewing, and one I’ll need to revisit before feeling comfortable with a judgment. In true honesty, I didn’t really ‘enjoy’ it the way I did something like Suspiria or The Beyond. It was pretty. Rather silly. And I know, very important. For now, I’ll leave it at that.