‘Suspiria’ Review: A witches’ brew of dizzying horror nonsense

Before I went to go see Luca Guadagnino’s horror remake Suspiria, I had heard that it was similar in feel and mood to the Darren Aronofsky’s incredibly divisive mother! which was a film that I initially found baffling yet eventually came to appreciate on a deeper level, aided by some very lengthy conversations with friends in the immediate days after I saw it. I saw a throughline in mother!, even though the methods that Aronofsky used to bring his allegory to life were somewhat elusive to me in after the first viewing. It stuck with me in an uncomfortable way, then a good way, then made me think, and I enjoyed the days afterwards as my confoundment melted away to understanding and even admiration.

But with Suspiria, not so much, because I don’t even know what the fuck that was.

I’ve tried to apply the mother! standard here, and for the life of me, I can’t seem to find a way to find any goddamned meaning in this film, who’s stylistic flourishes are so intriguing yet distracting that you forget that they might be trying to tell a story with some intellectual depth. Don’t get me wrong – there are some elements in the film that are memorable in a Tilda Swinton sort of way, and the aesthetic of the film definitely lends itself well to the imminent creep factor that pervades it, but I left feeling empty and tired and confused and kind of annoyed that it sucked 2 hours and 32 minutes out of my life.

You’ll no doubt find other reviewers who will dissect this film down to the bone and find infinite meaning in its subtler cues, but here’s basically the gist: it’s 1977 Berlin, and a young American dancer, Susie Bannion (Dakota Johnson) finds her way into a super swank contemporary dance troupe led by the stoic and formidable Madame Blanc (Tilda Swinton), who happens to belong to a coven of witches who preside over the school. The only person seemingly aware of any of the otherworldly elements within the dancing school is a Dr. Josef Klemperer (also played by Tilda Swinton in gobs of pretty effective old people make-up) who is tipped off by a fleeing dancer, Patricia (Chloe Moretz), that witches run the school. Susie has exquisite talent, which Madame Blanc is automatically drawn to, but given that she’s a witch and everything, you can imagine that things descend to batshit crazy pagan bloodbaths at some point.

The main issue I had with this film is that I couldn’t remotely care what happened to Susie’s character at any juncture in the film. I don’t know if it’s Dakota Johnson, or the direction she was given, but she gives me absolutely no reason to give two craps about what happens to her throughout the movie. It’s weird, because I wouldn’t go so far as to say that Dakota Johnson was bad in this, I just don’t know if the script has given us a character to care about here. Dakota Johnson often plays expressionless and aloof characters, but I would say that her portrayal of Anastasia Steele in the Fifty Shades franchise had more nuance and emotional heft than this one. That’s right, I said it.

Tilda Swinton, pulling double duty as Madame Blanc and Dr. Josef Klemperer, has the perfect blend of strangeness, intensity, and danger that lends itself perfectly to Blanc, while all of the vulnerability comes through in her portrayal of the elderly Dr. Klemperer. Madame Blanc is basically vintage Tilda Swinton, but it’s the way she disappears into Klemperer that’s truly impressive, and represents the only character that gives any emotional weight to the story. Tilda Swinton is essentially made for whackadoo movies like this, and they’re all the better for it.

Another thing that the film kind of gets right are the dancing rehearsal sequences. Many will find it reminiscent of Black Swan, which is a good thing, and it’s these scenes that allow you to marvel at the exemplary cast of dancers they employed for the film. These scenes are intense and show the true colors and motivations of each character rather well, and had this character development extended outside of the scenes in the studio, then Suspiria would have been much better off.

The coven of other witches are somewhat entertaining to watch at times, and supporting characters like Susie’s friend, Sara (Mia Goth), can be endearing and add some personality to the proceedings, but it’s not enough to save this obnoxiously chaotic narrative that doesn’t make any sense. There were several instances where I found myself saying “Okay, so I know this random thing has to mean something, I just have no idea what it is.” For example, many scenes have a tv playing in the background describing the intense political climate of Berlin during that time, and certain statements are made about the Holocaust. I have a feeling that they somehow think you know what the political climate was like in Berlin in 1977 (when the film takes place), and that certain references have to mean something, but I have no freaking clue what post-World War II Berlin was like, so I don’t know what all of the political references were trying to say , if anything. And what the hell does all this have to do with the freaking witches?! Once again, if I cared about anyone in this universe, I would have invested a bit more mental energy into trying to figure it out.

There are some people who will watch this film and absolutely adore it for the very reasons I found it so difficult to like. I would never describe myself as a horror aficionado, but I happened to love Hereditary earlier this year, and one could argue that that film also has plot points that aren’t fully explained or understandable. And I can deal with a certain degree of that if I care about the people on screen, especially the protagonist. I just didn’t here. But because I felt Toni Collette’s pain and grief in Hereditary, the stakes with the actual horror elements were much higher, resulting in a disturbing experience that stuck to my bones way after I left the theater (in a good way).

I suppose if you liked films like the original Suspiria, Black Swan, or Hereditary, you should give it a shot just in case my horror sensibilities and taste for things like a cohesive storyline don’t align with yours. But for yours truly, all I wound up with was a boiling cauldron of confusion and frustration soup , artfully presented.