IL GIOKO aka SCHOOL OF FEAR (Lamberto Bava, 1989)

Italian language teacher Diana Berti is hired by a prestigious private school halfway through the school year. On her first day as the new teacher, she learns that:
A) The previous teacher died.
B) A student was kidnapped the year before.
C) The students are a secretive, manipulative lot, and their headmistress (Daria Nicolodi) is their protector.
Nonplussed by the barrage of bad news, she starts the semester enthusiastically, though her optimism fades quickly when she catches onto a secret, sinister "game" that her pupils are playing in the school's basement. Little does she know that the kids have already waged psychological warfare on her, and intend to include her in their game.

Il Gioko is one of Bava's better made-for-TV movies, with some content that must have pushed the boundaries of acceptability at the time. The film kicks off speedily enough as the soon-to-be dead teacher is chased through a vault, stumbling across a severed head and teased by kids' shadows before falling to her death. The following 85 minutes or so do live up to the prologue's promise of steady pacing, heavy atmosphere, and general weirdness. The hurried conclusion, however, may be unsatisfying for most. Character-wise, my only beef was with Diana, who, despite being clever enough to catch on to the game and associate the students with her predecessor's death , cannot see that she is being played. Fortunately, her policeman boyfriend is there to keep her ignorance and rampant emotions in check. 1989 and the woman still needs a man to figure things out; guess that was the style at the time, but I digress.

This film is an unmistakeably Bava production. Though he's never had the most original ideas for his pictures, he's always given them a slick, professional look that is uniquely his. The fluid, voyeurish camerawork, stylized lighting, creative compositions, and even the soundtrack by frequent collaborator Simon Boswell are pure Lamberto. His recurring theme, "what horrors the kids get up to when the parents are away", as demonstrated in most of his previous work, is also found in Il Gioko. More mystery than horror, Il Gioko is somewhat engrossing and worth a watch, though one will be hard-pressed to track down this TV obscurity. Happy downloading!

Mini Bio : Daria Nicolodi

Born June 19, 1950, in Florence, Italy, actress Daria Nicolodi started performing at an early age. She dabbled in theatre and underground film before making her bigscreen debut in 1970's "Men Against". Her first daughter, Anna was born in 1973. She continued with theatre and TV appearances until her big break in 1975, when avant-garde thriller director Dario Argento cast her in his hugely successful Deep Red. A romance blossomed between the two, and that same year their daughter, actress Asia Argento, was born. Their union, which would last until 1985, started to unravel in 1977, when the two cowrote the masterpiece, Suspiria, based on a story Daria's grandmother had told her. Though the lead role was written for Daria, it was instead given to American cult-goddess Jessica Harper when the distributors demanded an American play the part. Perhaps the greatest injustice she was dealt was not being given any credit for her part in the film when it was released. It wouldn't be until two decades later that Dario finally gave her writing credits. It wasn't all doom and gloom though, as that same year she starred in Mario Bava's Shock. She continued to act in Argento's films until 1987, though throughout that time period she also acted in horror films for Lamberto Bava,and Luigi Cozzi, and even wrote Cozzi's Paganini Horror and Demons 6/ The Black Cat. Sadly, her daughter Anna died in an accident in 1994. To this day she continues to appear on TV, and not long ago had a part in Argento's Mother of Tears, where she performed alongside Asia.

Selected Filmography

Deep Red (Dario Argento, 1975)
Suspiria (Dario Argento, 1977 - writing and cameo appearance)
Shock (Mario Bava, 1977)
La Venere D'Ille (Mario Bava, 1979)
Inferno (Dario Argento, 1980)
Tenebre (Dario Argento, 1982)
Phenomena (Dario Argento, 1985)
Opera (Dario Argento, 1987)
Delirium (Lamberto Bava, 1987)
Giallo Natale (Turno Di Notte, TV Series, 1987)
Demons 6/ The Black Cat (Luigi Cozzi, 1989 - writing)
Il Gioko (Lamberto Bava, TV, 1989)
Paganini Horror (Luigi Cozzi, 1989 - writing and actress)
Scarlet Diva (Asia Argento,2000)
Mother of Tears (Dario Argento, 2007)

Visit Daria's official site HERE.

OPERA

(Dario Argento, 1987)

Things aren't looking up for opera singer Betty (Christina Marsillach), an understudy who has just been given the lead role in MacBeth after the original diva had an unfortunate accident (the first of many to come!). An insane fan of Betty's lurks in the wings, waiting until she's alone to tie her up and tape needles under her eyes so that she can't shut them as he mutilates her friends in front of her. Sadism's the name of the game though, and he releases Betty after each killing...

Opera may just be Argento's last great thriller before he Americanized and lost his identity. The plot's a familiar one, but here Dario inserts a little commentary and black humour, no small feat considering his humour normally falls flat on it's face. In Opera he also continues with his fairy tale theme, presenting Betty, like Jennifer in Phenomena or Suzy in Suspiria, as a girl drawn suddenly into an unfamiliar nightmare world. This is again reinforced through camera angles and set design. Another theme further explored is his love of animals, in this case crows, and the uncanny abilities they supposedly possess. Still don't get it, but meh...

Visually speaking, Opera is just as vivid and memorable as Dario's prior efforts. He throws in a couple of new tricks here, creating swooping bird's POV shots, and even a slow-mo closeup of a bullet passing through a peephole. He also managed to insert his/ Mario Bava's trademark coloured lighting. Other than the weak acting and story (used to it by now!), my chief complaint, as in Phenomena, was the juxtaposition of dreamy opera with thrashy metal in the soundtrack. I can see how it might be appropriate in the gore scenes, but it makes the film feel a bit disjointed.

On the plus side, however, there's an abundance of blood and kink onboard, and a cast of familiar Italian horror players, including Barbara Cupisti, Coralina Cataldi Tassoni, Urbano Barberini, Daria Nicolodi, and others too numerous to mention. Definitely worth a watch.

MOTHER OF TEARS

(Dario Argento, 2007)

Despite the buzz and excitement surrounding this film's release, it somehow managed to divide and alienate many of Argento's fans. At first glance, Mother of Tears seems almost like a rush job done only to please the fans of Suspiria and Inferno. The majority of the acting in the film is sub-par, even by Argento standards. Daughter Asia Argento, beautiful as she is, has never made a convincing lead actress. Her real life mother, Daria Nicolodi, who was cast as her mother in the film, is given a woefully small (and cheesy, thanks to the cheap CG effects) role. Udo Kier also puts in a brief appearance, but seems rather disinterested in the proceedings.

I guess I should probably tell you what the story's all about, now that I've gone and bashed it to pieces. Mother of Tears is the final installment in the so-called Three Mothers Trilogy, the other two being Suspiria and Inferno. MOT is about the return to life of the sole remaining sister, Mater Lachrymarum (Mother of Tears; Mother of Sighs was killed in Suspiria, and Mother of Shadows in Inferno).

Excavations in a churchyard reveal the casket of Varelli, the alchemist who designed the cursed houses in which the witches dwelt. Strapped to his coffin is a large urn, the inscriptions upon which alarm the priest present, and it is sent away for study. Art restorer Sarah Mandy (Asia Argento) and her colleague Giselle (Coralina Cataldi-Tassoni!) are the first the open and inspect the contents. Sarah is sent to find a text on ancient languages, and no sooner is she out of the room, Giselle is brutally (and I mean BRUTALLY) torn open by a trio of hooded demons and an evil monkey. Let that sink in.

Sarah narrowly escapes the ghouls herself (with some help from the other side), and calls in the police, who initially disbelieve her testimony. What she doesn't know is that she and Giselle have brought back to life a very powerful witch who intends to bring about the fall of Rome by driving its populace to madness, murder, and extreme kink! The chaos begins with a handful of isolated incidents, but soon spreads as more and more witches convene on the capitol. For reasons not yet known, Sarah and her boyfriend Michael find themselves targeted by the ruthless forces of Mater Lachrymarum, who kidnap Michael's son and leave a cryptic message scrawled in blood on his headboard.

The symbols in the message take Sarah to Father Johannes (Udo Kier), where she also meets Marta, a psychic who was friends with Sarah's deceased mother, Eliza (Daria Nicolodi). From Marta, Sarah learns that her mother was a powerful white witch who had died fighting Mater Suspiriorum. Sarah is taught (briefly) how to tap into her own innate magical ability (invisibility), and how to communicate with her mother, both of which prove useful. Sarah has little time to rest between stops, however, as Mater's forces are always close, and have a nasty habit of slaughtering anyone who helps her. The only way for Sarah to stay alive is to defeat Mater Lachrymarum herself.

If the story sounds a little derivative, you'd be correct. Dario threw in every cliche, and obviously borrowed more than a few ideas for the creation of MOT, many of them from his earlier films. I may also mention that MOT is choc-full of bad CG effects, and I mean painfully bad. Now that I've gotten the worst out of the way, it's time for praise!

One aspect of MOT that angered many was the lack of the trademark colored lighting previously employed in Suspiria and Inferno. Face it, folks: as much as we love those crazy Argento films of the 70's, they can never be reproduced. Even if they were, there'd be bitching and moaning about how Dario was only repeating himself. If one pays attention, he actually does play with color and lighting, but in a much more subtle fashion. They intensify only towards the end, when Sarah is in the witches' lair.

Argento went with a modern look here, again facing criticism for it. The witches aren't gnarled old hags; rather they look EXACTLY how someone who claims, nowadays, to be a witch would look: Goth-ish makeup, piercings, frizzy hair, and a complete lack of social skills! Still, they are more silly than menacing. Mater Lachrymarum herself, the "youngest and cruelest" and "most beautiful" of the Three Sisters, looks exactly the part.

On the technical side, Dario did make this a good-looking film with many memorable scenes and images. He's never really has a problem with photography and pacing; only the actors and stories seem to suffer in his productions. The gore and creature effects by Sergio Stivaletti are bang-on yet again, with the exception of one rubbery-looking witch-head. Another Argento regular, composer/ musician Claudio Simonetti, provided an unusually lackluster score for the film. I'd wait on viewing this one until you've seen the far superior Suspiria, and its confusingly bizarre sequel, Inferno. Buy it here.