Movie Review: Suspiria

Suspiria **** ½ / *****

Directed by: Luca Guadagnino.

Written by: David Kajganich based on characters created by Dario Argento & Daria Nicolodi.

Starring: Dakota Johnson (Susie Bannion), Tilda Swinton (Madame Blanc / Dr. Josef Klemperer / Helena Markos), Mia Goth (Sara), Chloë Grace Moretz (Patricia), Angela Winkler (Miss Tanner), Renée Soutendijk (Miss Huller),Doris Hick (Frau Sesame), Malgorzata Bela (Susie's Mother / Death), Vanda Capriolo (Alberta), Alek Wek (Miss Millius), Jessica Batut (Miss Mandel), Elena Fokina (Olga), Clémentine Houdart (Miss Boutaher), Ingrid Caven (Miss Vendegast), Sylvie Testud (Miss Griffith), Fabrizia Sacchi (Pavla), Brigitte Cuvelier (Miss Kaplitt), Christine Leboutte (Miss Balfour), Vincenza Modica (Miss Marks), Marjolaine Uscotti (Miss Daniels), Charo Calvo (Miss Killen), Sharon Campbell (Miss Martincin), Elfriede Hock (Miss Mauceri), Jessica Harper (Anke).

 

I have seen Dario Argento’s Suspiria (1977) at least three times now – once when I first found the DVD is a bargain bin somewhere, once about a year ago when I first heard Luca Guadanino was remaking the film, and once just two days before watching the remake – and I have to say this: as much as I admire it, I always forget the plot of the film. Argento’s film was smart in that it fully embraced what he was good at – the colorful, creative murder set pieces, and dreamlike sense of unease he was able to create, and de-emphasize what he isn’t good at – basically things like plot and character. I still don’t think I could pass a test on what happens in Argento’s film – because basically, as soon as the movie ends, I forget everything but the visuals.

 

Which brings us to Guadanino’s remake – which is an hour longer than Argento’s film, hugely ambitious and just as visually stunning as Argento’s film, but in an entirely different way. And unlike Argento’s film, this Suspiria is one I will be turning over and over in my mind for days, weeks, months, years after it ends, trying to parse its meaning. There is so much on display in Suspiria that it all risks being too much – and I’m still not sure if the storytelling in the film is deliberately ambiguous and complex, or not deliberately confused and sloppy. What I do know is that it is a film I can see myself revisiting time and again for years. It is a haunting, ambitious film – the type you have to admire, even if you hate – because you see someone attempt this so infrequently.

 

As in the original film, Suspiria focuses on Susie Bannion (this time, Dakota Johnson), a young American dancer who comes to Germany to study under the brilliant tutelage of Madame Blanc (Tilda Swinton). The film takes place in the same year as Argento’s was made – 1977 – at the height of a youth movement in Germany, which was attacking the old guard – with major figures like Baader and Meinhof in jail, and civil unrest gripping the country. As in the original film, the ballet company that Susie joins is actually a coven of witches – the older women who run the company are feeding, in a way, off their younger students. Susie arrives just as Patricia (Chloe Grace Mortez) has grown paranoid and run away from the company – she was their “chosen” one, and now they need another one. Susie’s ambitions, and talent, get her the role of the Protagonist in the latest production of one of Madame Blanc’s most seminal productions – first staged in the waning days of WWII.

 

In Argento’s film, anything that happens outside the company doesn’t make it into the movie – in Guadanino’s, it is entirely the point of his movie. Guadanino is making about a movie that looks at the larger context of what is happening – both what happened in 1944, when in effect, this famed company buried their head in the sand of what was happening in Germany, and put on a Nationalistic show, and now, when the young people are trying to snap the older generation out of their stupor – and confront what happened three decades prior. Unlike Argento, Guadanino doesn’t hide the fact that these women are witches – he tells you from the start as much. He has also branched out into making a movie about the patriarchal nature of society – there is one major male character in the film, Dr. Josef Klemperer, tellingly also played by Swinton, a Jewish doctor, whose wife Anke encouraged them to leave before the Nazis took over, but he refused – she disappeared during the war, and he has been haunted by this ever since. He comforts himself with the delusion that perhaps she survived and built a life elsewhere after the war – but deep down, he knows she died in the camps, and it is in part his fault because he didn’t listen to her. He gets involved because he is Patricia’s psychologist – the only one outside the company she tells about the coven of witches. He writes her off as delusional (once again, he doesn’t listen to a woman telling him the truth) – but then starts to investigate her claims after she disappears.

 

I could go on about the plot of the movie – although, to be frank, like the original film I’m not sure I could pass a quiz on it right now if I tried – but for entirely different reasons. What I will say is that even if the plot and themes of the movie are muddled (and to be fair, I haven’t decided if they are, or just require a few more viewings to fully parse) – but I will say is that Argento’s film, there are thrilling set pieces in the film. The best is the first time Susie dances the role of the protagonist in rehearsal – and we see, in another room, the dancer who turned down the role, Olga (Elena Fokina) get twisted and contorted, and brutally killed by unseen forces every time Susie movies, Olga’s body responds. There are other great set pieces of courses, but until the climax of the film, Guadanino refrains from the kind of colorful look of Argento’s film. This isn’t because he doesn’t admire Argento’s style – just that he is saving it for the climax for maximum impact. It works.

 

I will also say that while this is a movie that requires the actors to not fully reveal their characters until the end, all the performances in the film work wonderfully. I am glad that Dakota Johnson is now freed from the 50 Shades of Grey movies, because almost everything else I’ve seen her in, she has been great. Her role here as Susie starts out simply enough – the wide eyed, innocent girl from Ohio trying to make it as a dancer, but takes on more and more dimensions when she moves along (one question I still have about her character is how much she knows when she arrives0. Mia Goth is terrific as her best friend Sara, who can tell something is off. And veteran’s actresses like Angela Winkler and Renée Soutendijk are terrific as some of the older staff members. Chloe Grace Mortez, who continues to impress, has a great role getting the film off to a terrific start. The MVP is clearly Swinton though – in a triple role as the alternately kind and cruel Madame Blanc, as Klemperer, full of regret, and a third role I won’t say much about. It’s further proof that Swinton is one of our greatest, most risk taking actors.

 

This version of Suspiria is a film I will be parsing for a long time to come. You can argue many contradictory things about the film, and find a basis in the film for your argument. Is the film feminist or misogynistic? Does it use Germany history appropriately, to deepen the film, or is it merely a cheap and ugly way to try and make it look more complex? Is the story thrillingly ambiguous and complex, or sloppily constructed so it’s impossible to decipher what happens? These are the things I continue to throw around in my mind about the film – and I look forward to continue to throw about as I watch the film again and again and again.