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Italy is a country with a lot of problems. The government is rife with political corruption, organized crime has a stranglehold on the economy and key business leaders, their army has only been occasionally successful in their short history (not successful enough to prevent several invasions on their own soil, regional attitudes have been consistently poor since the country’s rather haphazard creation, and they kind of invented fascism. Not what you might call the best track record, but as bad as Italy can and has been, the numerous contributions to the arts and sciences that have come from that region is undeniable. In the past it was artists like Michelangelo and Da Vinci, and in the modern age it is directors like Federico Fellini and Sergio Leone, with a fine collection of artists, musicians, authors and actors in between. I don’t know what it is about shitty places to live, but they always seem to produce the most interesting stuff. Look at New York in the 70s, or San Francisco at any point in history. The shittier your living conditions, the more people will like your art.
Italy is no stranger to the horror genre, whether in film or otherwise. In fact the horror subgenre of giallo in Italian film was originally a literary genre, sort of like the pulp fiction novels of the American past, characterized by spicing up your normal mystery story with sex and horror. There have been many great giallo directors over the years, like Lucio Fulci (Zombie, The Black Cat) and Mario Bava (Black Sunday, Baron Blood), but for the purposes of the marathon I’ve decided to go with one of the most popular Italian horror directors, Dario Argento. Although his success in American theaters has been spotty at best, Argento forged a cult following through his frequent use of explosive violence and explicit sexuality in films that blurred the line between camp and horror. Plus he packed his soundtracks with Italian prog rock, which should be enough to get any music hipster at least marginally interested. You’d never see Cronenberg putting YYZ in one of his movies.
A plane touches down in Rome. On it is Peter Neal (Anthony Franciosa), a popular mystery novelist, whose latest book Tenebre was released a fews weeks previous and has been quite successful. The plan, according to his agent (John Saxon) and his personal assistant, is to do the talk show circuit as is expected and generally try to get some rest & relaxation in a foreign land. However, when a series of murders start occuring that fit the murders in Tenebre, every victim a young woman, throat slashed with a straight razor, Peter Neal is the first suspect. While a vicious killer stalks the streets of Rome for fresh victims, Peter Neal decides to start his own investigation to find out the answers on his own. Sometimes though, you’re better off in ignorance…
Tenebre kind of feels like the Stephen King story that never was (although I guess there is a King book turned movie called The Dark Half which is sort of like this, so whatever), it’s suspenseful but still feels a bit too cheesy to take seriously at the same time. That being said, Argento still managed to hold my attention throughout by crafting a mystery just bizarre enough that you wonder where’s he going next. The nudity and ultraviolence doesn’t hurt either. If you’re looking for a reason to avoid traveling to Rome this Halloween, why not try out some of Tenebre?
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