Horror Movie Review: Suspiria (2018)

Suspiria is a 2018 supernatural horror film directed by Luca Guadagnino with a screenplay by David Kajganich, inspired by Dario Argento’s 1977 Italian film of the same name.

In 1977, Susie Bannion leaves her Mennonite family in Ohio and arrives in West Berlin during the height of the German Autumn to audition for the Markos Dance Company. Her arrival coincides with the sudden disappearance of another dancer, Patricia Hingle. Who vanished after revealing to her psychotherapist, Dr. Josef Klemperer, that the school’s matrons are a coven of witches. They worship the Three Mothers—a trio of witches who once roamed Earth, known as Mother Tenebrarum, Mother Lachrymarum, and Mother Suspiriorum. Susie befriends a wealthy classmate, Sara Simms, while her dancing attracts attention from artistic director and choreographer, Madame Blanc.

During a rehearsal, Patricia’s friend, Olga Ivanova, accuses the matrons of being responsible for Patricia’s disappearance, as well as practicing witchcraft. She attempts to flee the school, only to become trapped in a room. Meanwhile, Susie performs a dance for Madame Blanc, with Susie’s movements physically inflicting damage on Olga’s body. The matrons find Olga and drag her away with large hooks. They informally elect Mother Helena Markos, an aging witch who has long ruled the coven, over Blanc as their leader. They conspire to use Susie as a host body for Markos. Miss Griffith, a sheepish matron, commits suicide afterwards.

Susie becomes Blanc’s protégée, earning her the lead role in the dance performance Volk. Meanwhile, Klemperer becomes suspicious of the matrons and seeks Sara’s cooperation to look at Patricia’s journals. Sara discovers a concealed corridor leading to the mütterhaus, an inner sanctum where the coven holds their rituals. She takes one of the large hooks and brings it to Klemperer as they look into Patricia’s disappearance. On the opening night of Volk, Sara returns to the sanctum and finds Patricia, her body decayed and withered. She is discovered by the matrons before the performance. Holes manifest in the floor, causing Sara to break her leg. Sara emerges midway through the performance, dancing her part in a hypnotic trance but collapses in pain before the dance ends.

Can the dancers complete the Volk? Does anyone really care?

When someone asks me: what’s the worst remake you’ve ever seen? I will now say, this film. It claims not to be a remake and merely “inspired by”. Which is laughable because it’s the same except it has a load of tacked on nonsense involved. They completely missed the entire point of the original movie and I know which one has stood the test of time, and will continue to be remembered for another 45 years.

Suspiria (2018) epitomizes very word pretentious. It’s hard to know which part is worse, the heavy focus on modern dance or the unnecessary historical back drop, or even perhaps the inclusion of a psychiatrist for no reason other than to give Tilda Swinton a role where she actually had to act. On the topic of acting, there is so little to say about the performances in this movie. They’re so incredibly dull. Instead of spending 2 years learning to dance, Dakota Johnson should have made time for acting classes. The only highlight was the contortionist but that was a very minor moment.

Suspiria (2018) is slow, wooden, nonsensical, drab. It literally and figuratively drains the colour out of the original concept. Its biggest crime is adding another hour onto the runtime, as if they had more to give. I could not think of much worse than having to sit through this again.