All the Pretty Colors

Architect Varelli, author of The Three Mothers, designed NYC apartment complex, occupied by Mater Tenebrarum

Rose is being followed, unable to get away within the labyrinthine apartment complex of the Mother of  Darkness

I personally feel Argento is to horror what Lynch is to crime drama: he’s a master surrealist. I read all the time from those very critical of Argento that his films make little-to-no sense, and it appears he doesn’t know what he’s doing in terms of telling a clear, concise, well-defined story. I truly believe that every single moment, every scene, is intricately designed, prepared, and elaborated exactly as intended in Inferno (1980). Now do we perhaps understand the point of Argento’s camera closing in on a lizard devouring a bug or eyeing a full moon in the sky? The bubbling pots heating by flame in an off-room inside a library as a mysterious man realizes Sara has a specific book on The Three Mothers that he badly needs to retrieve? Why that room underneath a store in New York, located by way of a hole in a floor, immersed in water, with a portrait of one of the Three Mothers is hidden? Who is the teenage girl with the cat eyeballing Michael intensely in the music class in Rome? Why would someone in Rome be so vigilant in killing anyone remotely close to unearthing the contents within the pages of The Three Mothers? And, even still, why would the book The Three Mothers be carelessly placed in the library, readily available for public consumption if its contents were to be so adamantly guarded? Sure we can rip apart what we might consider obvious, glaring, jarring inconsistencies but I fully believe in Argento’s mind, everything that appears confusing and illogical has its clarity and reasoning.

I was contemplating what might be an Argento companion to Suspiria this year, and Inferno sort of just felt right. You get similarities as seen just below with the taxi cab ride.

Suzy in Suspiria

Sara in Inferno

The Mother of Sorrows in Suspiria was the first to perish, and the second, The Mother of Darkness, resides in the “architecture of evil” in New York City in Inferno. Rose (Irene Miracle; The Puppet Master (1989)) unfortunately, like Sara (Ania Pieroni), happens on The Three Mothers, so she is “marked for death”. The one actually murdering them to protect the secret of the mothers isn’t as consequential as the identification of the actual witch herself. And while Rome has its own witch in The Mother of Tears, Mater Lachymarum, Rose’s brother, Mark (Leigh McCloskey) heads for NYC to locate his sister, not knowing of her own tragic demise. Mark loses a dear friend (Sara) and his sister (Rose) thanks to the cult of the witches. While Suspiria (1977) is far and away my favorite Argento film (and one of my all time favorite horror films period), Inferno, with each passing viewing, gains favor with me. I didn’t really like Inferno the first time I watched it, quite honestly, but by the third or fourth viewing, I was bewitched [pun intended] by it. It retains Argento’s strong sense of eyepopping color and once again (if not even better) takes us into this mysterious building where great evil dwells. It seems that no matter where Rose goes, no matter how fast she runs, the cluttered corridors and wind-swept curtains playfully alive while dangling from doorways produce the eerie feeling that evil is always present. I think Argento really gets that across well in Inferno: it almost always seems that Darkness leaves her influence on those around her. Drowning cats only to be eaten by rats, knife stabs in throats and backs, hatcheted meat, eyeballs hanging out of face, and other ghoulish delights just pepper Inferno as Argento never relents in going for his customary shock and awe.

And the further Rose “investigates” the building, its age and rot, cobwebs and depreciation, reveals its decay and ruination. All the while, Argento colors the building in striking reds and blues. Until the claws come out literally and Mother of Darkness emerges from the dark to surprise Rose, using a sharpened window pane as a guillotine. To make sure the window does its damage, the clawed hand makes sure to thrust it right into Rose’s throat, her frightened eyes realizing through the elongated monstrous fingers of Mother of Darkness that this is her end.

My slight IMDb review of Suspiria from back in 2007:

American New Yorker Suzy Bannion(Jessica Harper)finds that the
prestigious European ballet school she is attending could very well be
operated by practicing witches! It seems certain females who might've
gotten a bit too close to the truth of where the teachers were meeting
inside the school at night, meet grisly ends. Even a blind man, whose
dog bites the nephew of Madame Blanc(Joan Bennett), meets a grisly
fate..his dog mysteriously tears his throat out! When Suzy's new school
pal, Sara(Stefani Casini)comes up missing(we watch as someone pursues
her within the darkened school as she meets a horrible death getting
trapped in wire with her throat slashed by the murderer's blade), she
must find out the truth about this school or her life might meet the
same fate as the other victims. Suzy also suffers from health problems
once the portly female cook(with Blanc's nephew by her side)blinds her
with the reflection of sunlight bouncing off a butcher knife.

Argento, thanks to the supernatural aspects of the story, is set free
of the limitations a giallo holds him to. The marriage of the Goblins'
thrilling, unnerving score and his vibrantly effective use of color
creates a very unique experience. The opening grabs you instantly even
before you enter the world of Suzy..we see how genuinely vicious this
mysterious killer is. Built to scare the hell out of the viewer,
Argento attacks the senses with graphic attack sequences where it seems
the killer will never stop penetrating his knife into the victim's
torso. Developing the story of the school and the evil deep within it's
center, Argento gives the viewer an outrageous finale where chaos
ensues when Suzy meets the killer. Alida Valli is almost unrecognizable
as Miss Tanner, a tall, brutish teacher who seems as if she were
secretly a Nazi foot-soldier. And, horror icon Udo Kier has a minor
role as a psychiatrist who once had Sara as a patient.