Can High Art Exist in Low Art
Part Two
By Ricky E.
Follow Ricky on Twitter @kesslers_curse or on Letterboxd
Dario Argento – The Fetish of Red
Mario Bava might be considered the father of the giallo, the main director behind the giallo becoming a successful genre, was Dario Argento; who now recognized as the iconic master of the giallo. After his first entry into the genre with The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970); where he created what is now considered to be the traditional format for the giallo. What makes Argento’s work within the genre stand out from the rest, is not just his rather graphic approach to the use of violence on screen, but his stunning visuals, creative camera movement and from his colourful cinematography it was apparent that he was open to being creative and experimental with the use of colour in his body of work, especially with the colour red.
Argento once said, 'I am in love with the colour red, I dream in red. My nightmares are dominated by red. Red is the colour of pas-sion and the colour of the journey into our subconscious. But above all, red is the colour of fear and violence'. (Gracey, 2010 p24)
Taking from Argento’s own quote, he does come across as a man who has a genuine obsession with the colour red, and from looking at his body of work, there does seem to be connotations of fetishism and the colour red itself; not only with the use of graphic visuals of spilt blood, but also his applied use of the colour red in other areas of his films. He has always had misogynistic criticism thrown in his direction because of the nature of his films and their depiction of graphic violence towards beautiful women.
Gracey notes that “The fetishisation of weapons and murderous implements occurs frequently in Tenebrae, particularly in the flashback sequences featuring a woman 'orally raping' a man with the heel of her bright-red stilettos.” (Gracey, 2010 p91)
The fact that Argento goes out of his way to show a rather fetishist approach to torture, with a woman using her stilettos to choke her victim; her shoes are bright red adding to the scenes fetishism. I think that what Gracey is saying is that Argento is not only being creative with the use of what his killers use as weapons for murder, but he also makes a point of revisiting the colour red wherever possible, the use of the red stilettos in Tenebrae (1982) adds a kinky tone to the torture, and is glorified with their bright red finish which exemplifies Argento’s fetishist approach to murder.
Tovoli claims that Tenebrae was perhaps even tougher to light than Suspiria and the vaguely futuristic look was a challenge he relished tackling. The result is a striking looking film bathed in bright whites, with sporadic slashes of bright primary colours. (Gracey, 2010 p87)
I find it interesting to hear that Argento chose to have a giallo film bathed in bright whites; whilst on the surface this might seem like a rather unusual choice for a director making a genre film to work so boldly with a colour that could be deemed to be an almost non-colour, and coming away from the use of vibrant lighting, it actually turns out to be a masterstroke; as because the film is bathed in bright whites, when the use of primary colours comes into shot in Tenebrae (1982), they standout far more; therefore having a greater impact on the audience. It’s also key to note that you could argue that Argento’s fetish of the colour red reaches a new high in Tenebrae (1982), as what better way for blood to be seen than on a bright white background, it is also by far Argento’s most bloody outing in the giallo genre, which you could argue: that he is over indulging in the use of the blood shed.
In this clip from Tenebrae (1982) is a prime example of how Argento manages to use bright whites to make the redness of the victims blood standout greater. It is also worth noting the amount of blood that is sprayed across the white wall as the victim has her lower arm chopped off; the spray of blood is so excessive it borders on the ridiculous, but it’s evidence that Argento himself is bordering on the obsession with the colour red. As the woman
turns away and her blood sprays against the wall, what we see as a result is a screen that has a base colour of bright white and then half covered in bright red, Argento then follows this up this shot with a close up shot of an axe penetrating the victims back and we see the blood seep through the victims white dress, holding the shot until almost half of the screen is covered in red, and finally he cuts to the victim falling to the floor; as she turns around it is revealed that her dressed is soaked through with blood. The set itself; the walls, floor and appliances are bright white which makes sure that red is the only colour that holds our attention in the scene.
Even early on in Argento’s giallo career it became apparent that he had an eye for colour and for the colour red in particular, in Howard Hughes book Cinema Italiano talking about the cinematographer’s work on The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970); Hughes notes that “Storaro's Eastmancolor Cromoscoped images bathe the screen in colour-coded symbol-ism, usually involving lurid reds or bright whites.” (Hughes, 2011 p229-230)
Hughes here touches on something with regards to Argento and his use of colours within The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (1970); taking note of the use of bright whites and lurid reds, though he says that this use of colour is a form of symbolism, he doesn’t really expand this further which is a real shame, as he implies that there is a contextual method of symbolism used by Argento within the film with his use of the colours which red plays a huge part of, but he doesn’t elaborate on this, leaving us the reader to go out and view the film making up our own opinions.
Whilst Argento himself might actually explore the use of colour within the giallo, especially with the use of bright whites and creative lighting techniques using primary colours, it’s still clear that the colour red has a special place in his heart and he expresses his love for the colour throughout his body of work; in fact he at times does go the extra mile to have a personal touch with regards to the involvement of the colour red on screen.
"By 1975 [the black leather gloves] was a giallo cliche: the ritualistic adornment of leather, with its connotations of fetishism and sex, suggesting that [in Deep Red] the killer isn't just a psychopathic murderer but kinky with it" (Grainger 2000: 123). Even more playful, Argento also made it a habit in his films to don the black gloves himself in these sequences, partially as an homage to Alfred Hitchcock's cameos, but also, as Peter Bondanella noted, as "a humorous act of identification with his killers" (2001: 420) (Koven, 2006 p101)
Whilst the fact that Argento himself dons the black leather gloves of his film's killers, might be the main reason why he has been labelled as misogynistic by a number of critics, but this fact to me strikes as fetishist approach to how the colour red is used within his films, it could be argued that Argento isn’t happy enough with the redness of blood appearing on screen, but he himself has to be the one who physically makes this happen; with himself holding the weapons that penetrates the victims’ bodies causing the blood to flow. You might say that directing the colour red isn’t enough to appease his fetish; he himself has to be the one that paints the screen red, holding the symbolic brush that is the murder weapon of the killer.
The downfall of the Giallo and it’s potential rebirth
As the 70’s came to an end, so it seemed that the era of the giallo was dying off from the international scene; maybe because of producers eagerness to cash on what Argento had started by in the early 70’s it brought about a quick saturation in the market of gialli, this rapid production of trying to replicate the international financial success from the previous films might have created over exposure to an audience that became just too much and whom had grown tired of the style of the giallo and found the rise of the Slasher films from the American industry to cure their itch for exploitive violence and sex demand of what was the drive-in/grindhouse market and soon it was really only Dario Argento who was able to direct giallo in the modern day and make it financially viable because of his internationally recognizable name.
Sporadically, other filmmakers try to produce these old-fashioned-style thriller, with varying degrees of success, either in Italy or beyond. The best of the contemporary gialli, Occhi di cristallo (Eros Puglielli, 2004), which I was lucky enough to catch at Edinburgh’s “Dead by Dawn” film festival in 2005, while available on DVD in Italian, does not offer English subtitles or an English soundtrack. It seems that with the exception of new films by internationally recognized masters of the genre, such as Argento, these thrillers seem to be made exclusively for the local, vernacular audiences. And maybe that is as it should be. (Koven, 2006 p170)
Koven seems to be taking the view that while the giallo is still being made to this day, it has become on a much smaller scale and back to the vernacular, where it’s true roots lie. It would seem that he is implying that the giallo has no real significance to an international audience and that it should solely remain in the Italian third-run theatres.
While for a while it might seem that the giallo would just slip away into the memory of cult horror fans; in 2009 a French/Belgium co-production film Amer (2009) came out that paid homage to the giallo genre and in particular it’s three most famous directors; Mario Bava, Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci. The film itself recognized that the gialli narrative wasn’t that well structured and that the dialogue played second fiddle to the visual experience; with this Amer (2009) almost consists of no dialogue.
Amer (2009) would make such wonderful use of colour and is very reminiscent of Dario Argento’s work and especially Inferno (1980) in the underwater scene; the combination of the bold uses of red, blue and green are so boldly used to create a very atmospheric scene, and with the uses of such a variety of colours the film is able to express the feeling of fear, mystery and the supernatural to the audience through colour.
This film would also take influence in regards to the desire of fetishism within the genre, which plays such a strong role in the appeal of the giallo to the audience, with the scene which shows a close up of the woman's mouth slowly biting down on the metal seemingly of her own free will almost implying a playful approach to this fetishism of the genre. This would be supported further with the fashionable killer, who wears the infamous black leather gloves. One interesting thing of note from this film and the select scenes displaying the killer is that the film seems to experiment with the colour blue, where we, as the audience might expect the red, paying homage to Argento’s fetish of the colour. Instead this use of the cool of the stark blue in the scene represents in the 1970s to show such graphic and rather disturbing murder scenes, also could be read as how cool and calm and undeterred approach to the point of view filming of such graphic violence that the directors of the time had; especially with Argento, who as mentioned earlier, donned the black leather gloves himself from behind the camera.
Conclusion
With the evidence discussed with Amer (2009) and it’s homage to the giallo, there is certainly enough within the genre to be adapted to the modern day audience and something that can easily feel right at home in the art house cinemas. Its stylistic visuals and almost complete neglect for dialogue could really provide a starting point for a new era of art-house cinema, maybe not a resurrection of the giallo but certainly a new wave of genre filmmaking that is inspired by the genre itself.
Though the main question that was posed was to answer can ‘high art’ exist within ‘low-art’ and it appears that the giallo genre has shown plenty enough in it’s rich if not short lived history to provide enough artistic qualities, especially with the marvellous and thought provoking use of colour in film and the symbolism with the Italian traumas caused by Mussolini’s fascist reign. With the links to Mussolini and giallo dating back to the very first giallo; Ossessione (1942) which managed to get released under the nose of his fascist reign, there really should be a clear recognition not just from film academics from the horror aficionados that Ossessione (1942) was the first giallo film as well as being the first Itailan Neo-Realist film; no matter what the genre, whether it be high brow art or exploitation each has the equal right to their history and should be embraced and not ignored for the fear of being tarnished just because a genre can be linked with another genre that doesn’t fit within it’s artistic value.
There has always been a gap between High Art and Low Art; it’s something that most people would argue that has no connection, the art house/high art movement is completely separate from the low art/exploitation form and the Hollywood movement, but it appears that the genre itself manages to bridge the gap between high art and low art; whilst the films of the genres didn’t play in the art houses and first run theatres at the time and appealed more to the grindhouse cinema and drive-in audiences, the films themselves show great uses of colour in film and symbolize themes and atmosphere through their visceral lighting techniques and style, and not forgetting the strong link between the gialli killers and Mussolini, there is plenty of contextual theory to be read into and it is this quality that I believe can build bridges between High Art and Low Art; which could allow for a better appreciation of the art of film as a whole.
Read Part One here.
Bibliography
Coates, P,. (2010) Cinema and Colour: The Saturated Image. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Dalle Vacche, A. and Price, B., (eds). (2006) Color, The Film Reader. Abingdon: Routledge.
Gracey, J., (2010) Dario Argento. Harpenden: Kamera Books.
Hughes, H., (2011) Cinema Italiano: The Complete Guide from Classics to Cult. London: I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd.
Kerswell, J. A., (2010) Teenage Wasteland: The Slasher Movie Uncut. London: New Holland Publishers (UK) Ltd.
Koven, M.J., (2006) La Dolce Morte: Vernacular Cinema and the Italian Giallo Film. Lanham: Scarecrow Press, Inc.
Rigby, J., (2011) Studies in Terror: Landmarks of Horror Cinema. Cambridge: Signum Books.