MovieChat Forums > Suspiria (1977) Discussion > THIS was the movie I had heard such grea...

THIS was the movie I had heard such great things about??

posted 11 years ago by speedracer_54
78 replies | jump to latest

Christ, I gave up after half an hour. This movie was a colossal bore. Horrible, listless acting, wretched dialogue, weak plot.... If the first 12 minutes are the most terrifying, I could not imagine the crap I had coming in the rest of the film. It was not interesting, terrifying, mysterious or engaging in the least. Keep in mind, I love good, old-school horror & appreciate a slow-burn type of movie like House of the Devil (THAT is a masterpiece), but this movie seemed like half-assed student film that did not deserve my viewing.

[–] terrytsilvester 9 years ago

House of the Devil is far from as masterpiece my friend.

[–] 9 years ago

[deleted]

[–] ommik 9 years ago

I was thoroughly disappointed also! I found Suspiria to be childish, unoriginal, and noisy... only the visual style is stylish and trippy, which I like. But as a whole this movie sucked.

[–] The_TJT 9 years ago

Christ, I gave up after half an hour.

It gets slightly better towards the end. I admit the first half was rather slow moving.

Certainly not for everyone's taste, but the colours, atmosphere, sets, creativity and visuals in general make this rather exceptional film. Forget about the story and look at the moving pictures. It's a montage of images and atmosphere. One probably has to be a sort of a fan of older B-horror cinema to fully appreciate this. Or a true cinephile.

The problem is finding the two in same person... appreciating B films and also visual artistry. The dubbing was pretty horrible though.

I think "Phenomena" might be slightly more accessible Argento.

[–] mider2009 9 years ago

Reminds me of my friend saying the exorcist took too long to get into the action lol.

[–] Inh722 9 years ago

Speedracer_54 - Are you a Millennial by chance?
If so, I rest my case.
If you aren't, Italian horror is not for you.

[–] movie_nazi 9 years ago

I made the mistake of buying the DVD special edition, sight unseen, because of the reputation it had. Big mistake and last time I do that. So at the very least a life lesson was learned. It is over rated IMO but it does have some redeeming qualities. The cinematography is really beautiful and the music by Goblin is very well done. Although I did find the placement of certain pieces over used and played where it wasn't necessary.

The film's weak points IMO are its direction and weak script. Dialogue is terribly insipid and the plot kinda meanders along. What seems to be a trend with these Italian horror flicks (just finished Fulci's Gates of Hell trilogy) is that they favor style over story or more to the point story cohesion. It's as though they were like, "It doesn't make sense, I'll grant you that but doesn't it look AMAZING!?" . It's not a good when you are watching the film and going "WTF is going on now?" and to me that is a distraction which takes away from the horror element. It's kinda hard to get into the creep out mood when you are wracking your head trying to figure out how that last scene made sense or what exactly is going on with the story.

There are ALOT of die-hard Suspiria fans who will curse you and your children's children for talking negatively about their baby but I have to be that guy. The guy that says, "That baby is fugly!" while everyone keeps saying "Aww! What a cute baby!" 

Suspiria (1977) - 6 outta 10 stars

My Vote history: http://www.imdb.com/user/ur1914996/ratings

[–] Stratego (30822) 6 years ago

Very well said. I would rate it even lower.

[–] DonnaHurtlocker 8 years ago

Even worse is they are making a remake of this terrible movie with horrible actress Chloe Grace Moretz.