Film Review: Suspiria

The mere thought of remaking Dario Argento’s seminal 1977 horror film, Suspiria, should be considered hearsay, but when you throw in the talents of filmmaker, Luca Guadagnino, stars such as Tilda Swinton and Dakota Johnson, and composer, Thom Yorke, it suddenly turns into quite the curiosity. The original has been one of my all-time favorites, but this was something I was really looking forward to.

This new reimagining, which was written by David Kajganich, follows the same basic premise of the original. A young American woman, Susie Bannion (Dakota Johnson), goes to Berlin in order to join a prestigious dance academy, which is led by the mysterious Madame Blanc (Tilda Swinton), who takes a strange liking to Susie, embarking her on a dark journey into the academy’s supernatural underbelly.

I’ll keep comparisons to the original Suspiria to a minimum here. It’s almost unfair to call this a remake since it’s more of a riff on the ideas presented not just in Argento’s original film, but also in his spiritual follow-ups, Inferno (1980) and The Mother of Tears (2007), which make up The Three Mothers trilogy. It also, understandably so, takes a very different approach to the filmmaking, with a whopping two hour and 30 minute runtime, a mostly naturalistic aesthetic, and a novelistic style with the storytelling, consisting of six acts and an epilogue, as well as a far more ambitious thematic reach that constantly references multiple elements of its 1977 Berlin setting, including the Berlin Wall, the Lufthansa flight 181 hijacking, the Holocaust, the Red Army Faction, and various other socio-politically driven thematic beats. I love this in theory, but in execution, I found it all a bit lacking and superficial.

I have always been of the opinion that a horror movie doesn’t necessarily have to scare you to be considered good, and for a large chunk of it, it seems like Guadagnino has no intention of doing so. The film basically lets you know from the get go that witches are plotting behind the scenes, and the film builds slowly, taking its time with largely mundane day-to-day activities of the dancers and a psychologist, Dr. Josef Klemperer (Tilda Swinton, under distracting makeup). Occasionally, the film will throw some unsettling imagery that is effective, and it builds to a climax that is rather wild and delightfully deranged.

However, it never ultimately adds up to anything that I would consider meaningful or emotionally satisfying. The film is very cold, the characters aren’t particularly interesting, the dialogue is mostly opaque and monotone, and there’s a general self-serious aurora that becomes unbearable after a certain point. I don’t know if some additional trimming would have sufficed, or maybe a literal novelization to better flesh out its ideas, but as it is, the film is a lot of posturing and self-important build up to a payoff that doesn’t really say much of anything in regards to all its themes and motifs.

That said, the film is beautifully made, the details are rich and plentiful, and despite the characters not leaving much of an impression, the actors are well cast and do a great job in elevating the material. Dakota Johnson is a strong screen presence, Tilda Swinton does her thing, and supporting players like Chloë Grace Moretz, Mia Goth, Sylvie Testud, Angela Winkler, and Renée Soutendijk, among others, are all in on the distinctive wavelength that the filmmakers are working on here. There’s some compelling notes on the literal/metaphorical exploration of mother/daughter relationships, matriarchies, and femininity, as it relates to this specific context, but I feel like it would have been more interesting, and perhaps more coherent, if there were as many women involved behind the camera as there were in front of it.

It seems like Suspiria is designed to be one of those polarizing “love it or hate it” films, which makes things a bit awkward since I don’t feel attached to either direction. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel a tad disappointed, but I wouldn’t go as far as to say it’s a bad movie. There were moments that I loved and found haunting and provocative, and there were other moments where I was getting restless and bored. Maybe this is something that requires another viewing, which I can certainly see myself doing at some point in the future because it’s so artfully put together, and the great stuff is capital G great, but for the time being, I can only consider this to be a neat little creative exercise from a skilled filmmaker that is worth seeing as a curiosity, but not so much as a fulfilling experience.