Director Dario Argento is a long time favourite director of mine. This time it’s time to give the movie Inferno from 1980 a spin. Every time I put one of his movies on I feel that childlike anticipation that I’m going to be seeing something special. From the onset of this film it is obvious this is shot by a master of his craft. The colours and visuals are stunning and visuals just draw you in. The plot or continuity of the film however does lack something but I’ll go into that later.
THE BACKGROUND
This movie has a lot in common with an earlier Argento film, Suspiria. It has the similar vivid colours and a surreal feel to it that I’ve really only ever seen Argento capture in the way that has been done here. The other more important point is that it is kind of a continuation of a story which I’d become aware of surrounding “The Three Mothers”. The first in the trilogy being Suspiria and the last being Mother of Tears. I’ve seen both the other movies before but was unaware of the plot ties when I watched Suspiria, and only became aware of this after Mother of Tears, so it might be time to watch the trilogy again soon and see what more I can get out of this.
THE PLOT
Plot wise this follows the exploits of the residents of a building. One young woman, Rose who is obsessed by a book she bought called the “The Three Mothers”. It tells the tales of three demonic mothers who strike fear and death into the hearts of man. Does the book have any truth to it? Or is it just a book? The young lady tries to investigate and find three keys that reveal the identities of the sisters. There is a prophecy that says that the land the houses were build on will bring plagues and death. Rose believes that the apartment block she lives in is one of those houses. She investigates under the building and finds some grizzly stuff in what I can only assume is an underwater basement under the building.
Young Rose meets her own demise as do other residents of the building she is living in. It turns out the building itself was designed by an architect that worked for the three Mothers. Was there some strange occult stuff going on in the building? The residents try to find out bit by bit but meet their Grizzly doom one by one.
THE VERDICT
I feel as though this script is a little disjointed. Have I missed something in not realising it was part of a trilogy? Was I just unable to focus on the film? Without being able to fully appreciate the script its hard for me to give this an honest review. I feel I’ll have to take a weekend out and watch all three films back to back as its been so long since I watched the others.
The visuals in Inferno were immensely enjoyable. There were some great killings in the film. I should say, I don’t feel this film was of the same calibre as Suspiria. Standards I have to say have changed a lot since this film was released. Some of the killings look fake in that 70’s way which I really like. Other things like some animal killings would have much of this generation up in arms. This is definitely a step up in terms of extremity from Suspiria.
Over all I’d say give this one a go. I’m going to watch it again to see what aspects of the film i’ve missed the first time round and re-do this review shortly. I feel that Argento is a master of his craft and the fact I didn’t fully comprehend what was going on was more on me than his directorial abilities.
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