Troy Howarth's review (author of the very good Mario Bava book,THE HAUNTED WORLD OF MARIO BAVA):
"Dario Argento's recent films have been met with disdain in most quarters, and in a way it's easy to see why. The man who established himself with generally serious, calculating, sometimes sadistic horror thrillers has taken to delivering more tongue in cheek, sardonic exercises in Grand Guignol. While I've retained my enthusiasm for his output, I admit it's been more hit or miss in recent years, sometimes within the same film. I like Mother of Tears and The Card Player, but have little use for Sleepless, Do You Like Hitchcock? and Jenifer. Even MoT and CP, however, have their drawbacks. Part of it is simply budgetary. Whereas Argento in the past was able to work freely, with ample funding and adequate time, his recent films have been lower budgeted and more rushed in their production. With regards to English language dubs, something has been seriously amiss since his return from America. I guess the standard of work in the dubbing industry has gone downhill, but it's hard to say. Some of his new films have utilized largely production sound recording, but the occasional bits of looping can be jarring to say the least. When word surfaced that he was directing a giallo in the "old school" style from a script by American writers, even I had my doubts. As word began to leak of production woes, and of Argento losing control of the film in editing and beginning to badmouth it at festivals, my heart sank. I therefore approached Giallo with a sense of built in disappointment. Heated exchanges on this very forum instilled me with an almost perverse desire to dislike it - if nothing else, I figured, at least it would show that I, too, can look down on a lesser achievement of a favorite director. Not that I really should feel the need to do this, since I've already vented my dislike of some of his recent films, afterall.
Which brings me to Giallo, which I viewed last night thanks to the kindness of my fellow Argento nut, Guillaume.
The story is simple enough: a cabdriver suffering from Hepatitis (which has marked him as a freak from childhood, as his skin is jaundiced) abducts beautiful, foreign women with no connections to the city of Turin. Thus, he is able to work without attracting much attention, as he reduces their beautiful visages to pitiful scarred remnants closer to his own unattractive appearance. Hardboiled cop Enzo is on his trail, and he finds an eager collaborator in the sister of the murderer's latest victim....
Despite what the credits say, Argento did not write Giallo - though he certainly reworked aspects of the script to his own specifications, thus earning some credit on the final product. The script itself isn't a traditional giallo as such - the identity of the killer is revealed early on and the film is less concerned with surprise reveals than it is in exploring his twisted psychopathology - if anything, the film is closer to Mario Bava's blackly comic Hatchet for the Honeymoon (1969) in this regard. Yet, whereas Argento's recent films have tended to be tongue in cheek and overtly quirky, Giallo is more restrained and serious. It never gets so over the top or goofy as Mother of Tears, for example. Who knows, perhaps Argento WANTED humor and it was axed; could this account for his disappointment with the final edit? In any event, I may as well cop to it right now: I expected to hate this, but I ended up having fun with it. It's far from classic Argento, don't get me wrong, but as mainstream thrillers go, it's well crafted and very entertaining. It's one of Argento's best paced films, too, which certainly helps. It moves quickly, the characters (stereotypes, yes, but this is typical of the giallo) are interesting and engaging and there are a few nasty bits peppered throughout.
On the downside, it's a rather bland looking film. It also suffers, like so many of his recent films, from a rather inadequate music score. Marco Werba's soundtrack isn't bad, but it lacks the sheer punch of his best collaborations with Goblin and Ennio Morricone. Mother of Tears , Hitchcock, and his Masters of Horror episodes also suffered from this deficit, so one can only hope that his next project will be more inspired in that regard. As to the look of the film, if anything it evokes the "dogma" approach of Card Player, but it lacks the finesse of Benoit Debie's lighting. The camera movements and compositions are clean and efficient, but the lighting lacks punch, beauty and atmosphere. Some of this may be deliberate, but much of it just smacks of low budget haste. Fans who insist on remembering Argento for his hyper-stylish camerawork on Opera (1987) may bemoan that he doesn't try any more. Well, a look at his past credits reveal that Opera - and to a lesser degree, the films that immediately followed: Two Evil Eyes (1989) and Trauma (1992) - was something of an aberration. His use of camera movement was never so aggressive, and it really represented the apotheosis of this aspect of his cinema. His earlier films seldom were so consistently fluid - they interspersed stylish setpieces with more restrained, conventional filmmaking. In any event, Argento does indulge in some baroque camera work in Giallo, notably in Enzo's flashbacks to his traumatic childhood.
The usual Argento thematic tropes are here, from Enzo's trauma to the killer's perverse fascination with sadism. It's recongizably an Argento film, something I wouldn't say for Jenifer or Do You Like Hitchcock?, for example. It may not represent his most accomplished work, but neither is it the disaster some have made it out to be. In a way, I'm a little surprised that it's been so hotly dismissed in some quarters - if anything, it's closer to the "give the audience what they want" approach of Sleepless than his other recent films, though I would argue that this is the more interesting film by far.
Brody gives a fine performance, and Seigner and Elsa Pataky are also effective in their roles. Argento's films aren't renowned for their thesping, but he's typically drawn competent performances from his cast. Happily, the English track for this film is vastly superior to much of his recent Italian work. Much of it seems to utilize on-set recording, and the characters that are looped don't stick out like a sore thumb. This seems to have been a positive influence of Adrian Brody, based on a couple of pieces I've read.
Ultimately, I don't wish to overstate things. Giallo is not a great film, either on its own terms or when viewed in Argento's overall body of work. It is, however, a fun and accomplished little film. I've no idea what Argento's edit would have been like, but I love the ending in particular - it evokes the Cat O'Nine Tails (1970) in more ways than one."
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