Occhiali neri

I have seen Occhiali neri last night at FEST - International Film Festival, Belgrade . It's a very strange Iittle thriller, very bizarre and very low budget. The plot is extremely silly, with water snakes and other over-the-top decisions, but that's Argento for you. We don't expect logic in his films. Do we? There is warmth in it as well, it's very character driven. It feels rushed in places and acting is so-so, but overall you should definitely see if you're Argento fan. It's his best since Nonhosonno, fast paced and never boring. And yes... it's very gory. The third act reminded me of the begining of Rob Zombie's Halloween 2, because it's basically a long chase scene in the countryside. The OST is great.

I found the film a little bit lacking. This is a slasher film and not Citizen Kane! Dario has done some great innovative stuff over the years and while this not being one of them I found it entertaining.

I guess you could call Dark Glasses a return to form for Dario Argento in the sense that it's better than Dracula 3D. It more or less feels like an actual film, and while it's a bit too simple and not particularly exciting, outside a couple of brief moments here and there, it's arguably competent enough to be sort of watchable. It's certainly not a return to form in the sense that it rivals the filmmaker's best stuff, even if the premise here is something that's easy to imagine Argento tackling in the 1970s or 80s.

I've been on a bit of a binge of the filmmaker's work for research/writing purposes, but I think I might bow out gracefully here. I've seen about 80% of his features, I think? It feels like enough for me, because while the only genuinely bad one I've seen has been Dracula 3D, the majority of his 1990s to 21st-century stuff has done very little for me. But it's been somewhat worthwhile to watch most of his stuff, and I think doing so will make me appreciate his earlier movies even more, should I revisit any of them one day.

Music - awesome. Photography - decent.

Everything else - lame.

Still better then Argento's Dracula, though.

All in all - for diehard Argento fans only.

'Dark Glasses' is the latest project from legendary filmmaker Dario Argento that showed up as a Shudder original with little to no fanfare. The 82 year old director is best known for the films he made from 1970 into the late 80's and for helping to popularize the Italian genre of the "giallo" thriller. His fame mostly comes from his extremely inventive choices and daring camera work. Very much an artist who valued style over substance, he made some great movies ('Suspiria,' Deep Red'), some bad ('Inferno,' 'Mother of Tears') and a few truely bizarre ones ('Phenomena'). After 1987's 'Opera' many argue that his career went downhill fast. It's true that going into the 90's the quality of his output greatly decreases. There are a couple of projects that aren't terrible ('The Stendhal Syndrome,' 'Trauma') but that's about it.

'Dark Glasses,' his first movie in ten years, does mean that his last film won't end up being 'Dracula' - which was pathetic and embarrassing on every single level. That's the good news, however his latest is hardly a spectacular comeback. The story is very "giallo-esque" in nature featuring a mysterious killer who targets prostitutes. Our main character Diana (Ilenia Pastorelli), a lady of the night, crosses paths with said killer resulting in a car accident that takes her eyesight. It also results in an unlikely friendship with a young boy named Chin (Andrea Zhang). She is also helped during her recovery process by a professional blind person therapist (?) played by Asia Argento. So the scene is set for a 'Wait Until Dark' type thriller as the maniac remembers that he wants to kill her and then kind of tries to do that sometimes..

The film isn't really concerned with the mystery aspect of the story, it only gives you one red herring so it's pretty easy to figure out who the killer is. Much of the run time is dedicated to Diana's relationship with Chin, creating a certain amount of heart that's usually absent in this type of film. It's kind of touching in spots although mostly forgotten as everybody starts running away from the murderer because they don't want to get murdered. Once the movie settles into the thriller aspects it loses steam, becoming pretty routine. There are some trademark lapses in logic as well, like why the killer doesn't try try to finish the job during Diana's weeks (or months, possibly years?) of rehabilitation where she's vulnerable and alone much of the time, only striking when there's lots of police officers hanging around.

Some of the positives: The performances are pretty good, they use practical effects instead of CGI for most of gags and the musical score captures past Goblin vibes fairly well. The main problem with 'Dark Glasses' is that it's so average. There are some Argento touches like the tracking shot along a wall lit by primary colors panning down to actors running down an ally, or a brief shot from a dog's point of view but there's nothing much here to remind us of the great talent behind the camera. It's good to see him back with this, as well as his recent lead performance in Gasper Noe's 'Vortex.' Hopefully we're experiencing a late career renaissance for Argento, I also hope his next picture is a true return to form. 5/10.