For #25-26-27, I went with three serious foreign films.
The Fifth Cord (
Giornata nera per l'ariete, Bazzoni, 1971) – This might just be the most giallo of all gialli. It's a formulaic example of what the classic giallo film would be remembered as. Most of all, it's an amazingly beautiful film, with great sensibility in direction, pace and tension. It has all the elements you'd expect from a giallo (including Morricone), but it manages to use them all in refined and controlled measures (even Morricone, who's himself put aside in moments of silent tension) – with only the final confrontation dragging a little, but not without some more aesthetic high notes. It lacks the ideas of the better Argento films and the narrative might be a little too simple (still an ok whodunit), but it's just a splendid film. Bazzoni has only made a few films, but he shows here that he was at a level of mastery that only very few filmmakers of the genre could pretend to.
7/10
Deep Red (
Profondo rosso, Argento, 1975) – If there's a perfect genre film, this might be it. Not only is it astonishingly beautiful, but it's also a brilliant masterclass in filmmaking. It's my favorite giallo, and my favorite whodunit too. Now, if you haven't seen it, I suggest you don't read this comment and just go find it (the version on
Shudder is ok, but lacks a few interesting elements). I used to present the first murder in class to demonstrate how framing and editing could direct the spectator's attention (something that horror films often overuse in the construction of the jump scares). In
Deep Red, once you know, you know, but if you don't you normally get played (and in such ballsy fashion, with not only the face of the killer in frame, but a very blatant and beautiful call out just beforehand, through the allusion to Helnwein's
Nighthawks, that we should pay attention to the paintings that are not really paintings). The investigation might rely on too many coincidences, but it remains engaging throughout – and even if you do (hopefully) get played, you can still solve it. Its most obvious solution lies in a mirror, but you can solve it through a drawing (which also gets in-frame when a piece of wall falls off) and the film ends on the reflection of its main character in a pool of blood – simple use of reflexive devices that appear through the whole film, strengthening its very gialloesque themes of sight, witnessing and remembering. To the numerous elements going that way (from the medium having
visions to the many eye close-ups), Argento adds a self-reflexive layer that goes from the simplest acknowledgment of the film's fabrication (the theater's closing curtains, the many paintings), to clearer hints of its own apparatus (recordings and frames – the identity of the killer is revealed a few times, just out of frame), to a comment on his own cinema (the pianist complaining that his music is too clean and precise and should be trashier – missing from the
Shudder version). The character repeating that the solution should be in the missing painting, an allusion to
The Bird With the Crystal Plumage, puts emphasis on the need for pictorial analysis – the casting of David Hemmings only adds another intertextual echo pointing to it (contrarily to the character of The Bird, he won't find the painting he is looking for - and the invitation really is directed to the spectator as investigator, for him to analyze what he has seen - but there is that kid drawing he should have paid more attention to).
The original trailer is also in itself a tour de force, certainly an important influence on the giallo pastiches of Cattet and Forzani. The film does have a few weaknesses, some rapid inserts that jar with the rhythm (something a lot of gialli suffer from), a very poor performance by Macha Méril (luckily she's the first one offed), and, to me – I know it's blasphemy – its music. Everything intradiegetic (the nursery rhyme, the piano) is perfect, but the Goblin score, as much as it makes the film quite unique and participates in the overall saturation of the senses it aims for, often goes against the otherwise very efficient dreadful atmosphere and pace.
9/10
The Bird With the Crystal Plumage (
L'uccello dalle piume di cristallo, Argento, 1970) – Much more conventional in its narrative choices and direction, Argento's first film is still another gem and could just as easily be considered as the high mark of the genre. It has the same basic structure as
Deep Red: the main character, witness to an act of violence, tries to remember exactly what he has seen in order to solve the case. The main difference here is that the spectator is merely spectator and not invited to take part in the game (we haven't seen the
forgotten detail). A much simpler work, but still a great giallo and a great film (as some of you need validation from kihei, here's a quote from the master: “Director Dario Argento is an absolute master of suspense in the conspicuously stylish
The Bird with the Crystal Plumage.”). There's already a few hints of things to come, the character as writer (instead of pianist), frames within the frame, paintings, freeze frame as still photographs with frame marks, etc. The main character is clearly positioned as spectator of the first attack (see screenshot), an observer separated from the action, but these ideas here are pretty much limited to the usual themes of the gialli - only used with enhanced style and panache.
8.5/10
And yes I have seen Wadjda, it's basically why I was curious about her next film. I also saw it at 'other places' but always had troubles for that one.
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