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.

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.

SUSPIRIA

(Dario Argento, 1977)

Suzy Bannion (Jessica Harper) flies to Freiburg, Germany, to attend a prestigious dance academy. The night of her arrival, one of the students is brutally murdered (in one of the grandest opening murders ever!), and Suzy soon finds herself forcibly moved into the academy as a boarder.There she meets fellow American Sara (Stefania Casini), a girl of nervous predisposition who informs Suzy that she believes the school may be run by a coven of witches. Before long, Suzy also comes to believe that the teachers may be hiding a rather nasty secret, and it's hidden deep inside the school.

Supiria is rivaled perhaps only by Black Sunday as the quintessential Italian horror film, and it's no wonder why. When released in 1977, there was no other film like it, and to date no horror film has been able to reproduce the experience that is Suspiria. Technically speaking, it's a beautiful film. Muder is portrayed artistically and attractively, and each set piece is a a breathtaking short horror film in itself. Dario Argento's camerawork, compositions, and psychedelic lighting schemes pair well with the Art Nouveau and Baroque-inspired sets and Goblin's crashing electronic score to create their own frightening universe, the likes of which might well blow newcomers' minds, if not baffle them entirely. Be prepared for ballet, barbwire, maggots, and murder. The Euro Horror standards of red paint for blood, somewhat stilted acting, and occasional moments of pure nonsense are all at hand, but not distractingly so, especially for fans of that subgenre.

Suspiria was actually written by Dario Argento and his then-wife Daria Nicolodi, based on a story that Daria's grandmother had told her as a little girl, as well as Dario's found elements from Thomas De Quincey's "Confessions of an English Opium Eater". According to Dario, the intense colour scheme in the film was inspired by Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs", though one can see a touch of Mario Bava's influence on the lighting as well. It truly is a fairy tale for adults that stretches the limits of reason and credibilty, and succeeds in doing so as it has its own nightmarish logic and rules. To sum things up, I highly recommend Suspiria, especially to first-time viewers of Italian horror films. It never grows old with repeat viewings, either.