Friday night is fright night at Leeds Grand Theatre. Scores upon scores of people dressed variously as Dr. Frank N. Furter, Janet Weiss and Riff Raff are excitedly piling into the main auditorium to see the Rocky Horror Show, Richard O’Brien’s evergreen musical celebration of science fiction and horror B-movies, whilst those in far more conservative attire are heading towards the building’s Howard Assembly Room to watch Suspiria.
Almost 40 years after its initial release Dario Argenta’s giallo horror movie is being shown here tonight with a live musical accompaniment by Goblin, the Italian progressive rock band who recorded the original soundtrack to the film.
Described by no less than the Master of Horror himself, John Carpenter as “like being inside of a painting” Suspiria is a visceral onslaught on the senses. The last European feature film to be shot in glorious Technicolor, the heavily saturated cinematography brings its vivid primary colours to lurid and frightening life.
Inspired, in part, by Walt Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs – perhaps more for its vibrant colour scheme than the actual storyline – Suspiria is the eerie tale of a young American ballet student who unwittingly encounters, and eventually takes on a witches’ coven in Germany.
The plot – and for what little there is of it – is rendered largely irrelevant as you find yourself completely immersed in the film’s overwhelming visual and auditory assault. Dario Argenta and the great Italian cinematographer Luciano Tovoli together created a lush, virtually translucent landscape, its startling dichotomy of beauty and horror further magnified by Goblin’s mightily resounding score.
This incarnation of Goblin – there are currently a number in existence – features original band member Claudio Simonetti on keyboards and guitar, drummer Titta Tani and Bruno Previtali on bass guitar and bouzouki. Never has the bouzouki sounded so sinister. Building their accompaniment around a keyboard leitmotif – influenced, you strongly suspect, by the piano intro to Tubular Bells (itself used in another one of the most scary films ever made, The Exorcist) – Goblin’s rich kaleidoscope of sound accentuates the dramatic tension, blood and bewilderment that spills out in front of our eyes.
For all that Suspiria is overblown and occasionally preposterous (perhaps moreso when viewed through the often uncharitable telescope of history) – the psychiatrist Frank Mandel’s line “bad luck isn’t brought by broken mirrors, but by broken minds”, for example, is risible – the film still stands proud and tall as a magnificent experimental work of art that rightly retains its position as a horror classic.
Some photos from this performance can be found HERE
