A young policewoman slowly goes insane while tracking down an elusive serial rapist/killer through Italy when she herself becomes a victim of the brutal man's obsession.
A young man tries to help a teenage European girl who escaped from a clinic hospital after witnessing the murder of her parents by a serial killer and they try to find the killer before the killer finds them.
Director:
Dario Argento
Stars:
Christopher Rydell,
Asia Argento,
Piper Laurie
An older, retired police detective and a young amateur sleuth team up to find a serial killer who's resumed a killing spree in Turin, Italy after a 17-year period.
Director:
Dario Argento
Stars:
Max von Sydow,
Stefano Dionisi,
Chiara Caselli
A newspaper reporter and a retired, blind journalist try to solve a series of killings connected to a pharmaceutical company's experimental, top-secret research projects and in so doing, both become targets of the killer.
Director:
Dario Argento
Stars:
James Franciscus,
Karl Malden,
Catherine Spaak
Gory remake of the Gaston Leroux classic story, only this time, the phantom is not disfigured, but a man who was raised by rats deep under the Paris Opera House.
Director:
Dario Argento
Stars:
Julian Sands,
Asia Argento,
Andrea Di Stefano
A Rome policewoman teams up with a British Interpol agent to find a crafty serial killer whom plays a taunting game of cat-and-mouse with the police by abducting and killing young women and showing it over an Internet web cam.
A college film student, obsessed with the works of Alfred Hitchcock, investigates a murder committed in the apartment building across from his and suspects that his seductive neighbor hired a girlfriend to commit the deed.
An American college student in Rome and his sister in New York investigate a series of killings in both locations where their resident addresses are the domain of two covens of witches.
An American expatriate in Rome witnesses an attempted murder. He learns later that it's connected to an ongoing murder spree in the city, and decides to do his own investigation, despite being personally targeted by the killer.
Director:
Dario Argento
Stars:
Tony Musante,
Suzy Kendall,
Enrico Maria Salerno
Anna Manni is a policewoman trying to capture a vicious serial rapist and killer. The problem is that she suffers from "Stendhal's syndrome", a psychosomatic disease that gives her dizziness and hallucinations when she is exposed to the sight of paintings and artistic masterpieces. When the maniac lures her into a trap inside Florence's famous Uffizi museum, her troubles are just beginning...Written by
Giancarlo Cairella <vertigo@imdb.com>
This would be the last fiction feature film for acclaimed director of photography Giuseppe Rotunno. The following year he shot a documentary on Marcello Mastroianni before retiring. See more »
Goofs
Though featuring prominently during the film's opening sequence set at the Uffizi in Florecne, Peter Bruegel's 'Landscape with the Fall of Icarus' is actually housed at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts of Belgium in Brussels. See more »
This film premiered on video in the UK, but 11 cuts totaling 2m 47s were made by the distributor before submission to the BBFC for a video certificate. These cuts were to the rape scenes, slow motion bullet impacts and a woman's face being slashed with a razor. The 2010 Arrow reissue is the full uncut print. See more »
Definitely heady stuff from a filmmaker whose prior experience with psychological subtext has been problematic at best, this film highlights a fearless performance by Asia Argento. The obvious "Argento touches" (i.e., pills rattling down an esophagus, the bullet through a woman's face) stick out like a sore thumb, as they act not in service to the story but rather to reference what is expected from Argento; after the catastrophe of Trauma (Argento imitating a hack filmmaker imitating Argento), this film goes in directions that the director's previous films had only hinted at, and doesn't lead to rely on trademarks for a crutch.
The pace of the film is extremely well-handled in the first half, although it seems to lose track in the second half exactly where the narrative should be tightening up. But given Argento's lack of experience with more plot-driven material, this is in some measure to be expected. Cinematography, sets, art direction are all exemplary.
The acting is always a sore point for Argento movies. Here, only a couple of actors are allowed to give performances, but they make them count. Thomas Kretschmann is only on screen a few times, but gives a strong enough impression in that time (and not simply because of the brutal material contained there) that his role seems much larger. However, the film lives or dies with Asia's performance, and she throws herself into it with abandon. She's ultimately more convincing when she's required to be fierce than when she's required to be vulnerable, but goes through a bewildering range of emotions with scarcely a false note. And it's to her credit that it's so unsettling watching the torments her father subjects her to, so to speak, because she commits herself to their realization so thoroughly.
Comparing this to films from Argento's peak period is not really applicable...it comes from an entirely different vein. Which makes it all the more depressing that his next movie would be Il Fantasma dell'Opera, easily his worst.
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Definitely heady stuff from a filmmaker whose prior experience with psychological subtext has been problematic at best, this film highlights a fearless performance by Asia Argento. The obvious "Argento touches" (i.e., pills rattling down an esophagus, the bullet through a woman's face) stick out like a sore thumb, as they act not in service to the story but rather to reference what is expected from Argento; after the catastrophe of Trauma (Argento imitating a hack filmmaker imitating Argento), this film goes in directions that the director's previous films had only hinted at, and doesn't lead to rely on trademarks for a crutch.
The pace of the film is extremely well-handled in the first half, although it seems to lose track in the second half exactly where the narrative should be tightening up. But given Argento's lack of experience with more plot-driven material, this is in some measure to be expected. Cinematography, sets, art direction are all exemplary.
The acting is always a sore point for Argento movies. Here, only a couple of actors are allowed to give performances, but they make them count. Thomas Kretschmann is only on screen a few times, but gives a strong enough impression in that time (and not simply because of the brutal material contained there) that his role seems much larger. However, the film lives or dies with Asia's performance, and she throws herself into it with abandon. She's ultimately more convincing when she's required to be fierce than when she's required to be vulnerable, but goes through a bewildering range of emotions with scarcely a false note. And it's to her credit that it's so unsettling watching the torments her father subjects her to, so to speak, because she commits herself to their realization so thoroughly.
Comparing this to films from Argento's peak period is not really applicable...it comes from an entirely different vein. Which makes it all the more depressing that his next movie would be Il Fantasma dell'Opera, easily his worst.