Phenomena

Each and every Dario Argento film has its admirers.  Perhaps because no matter how illogical, flawed or flat-out inept some of his films may be, there's always a bright spot (or two...or three) that could have sprung from the visual imagination of no other director.  Phenomena (1985), released as Creepers in the U.S., is his first cinematic foray into the truly absurd.  But for every head-scratching moment of this Carrie-gone-giallo thriller there is one (or two...or three) instances of demented genius at work.

 

A killer is stalking the young girls of Switzerland, claiming his victims in an area known as the "Swiss Transylvania" and rarely leaving a complete body for investigators to gather clues.  Jennifer Corvino (Jennifer Connelly), the daughter of an absent movie star, arrives at the local boarding school and becomes an accidental witness to the next murder while sleepwalking.  She's led to safety by a trained chimpanzee, the hired help of Professor John McGregor (Donald Pleasance), an entomologist who just so happens to be working on the case.

 

McGregor, intrigued by Jennifer's ability to communicate telepathically with insects, teams her up with a fly trained to detect dead bodies.  Together the pair follows the route used by the killer in hopes of finding a stash of corpses.  But as Jennifer gets too close to the truth, people around her begin to die, leaving her to face the deadly threat on her own...unless she gets some help from her insect friends.  

 

Phenomena is just as bizarre on screen as it sounds on paper.  Argento unapologetically lifts from his own films like Suspiria and Deep Red while inserting half-finished ideas and half-baked explanations.  Jennifer's ability to speak to insects, while marketable on the back of a VHS box, feels completely out of place in the giallo universe.  Connelly, who, to the best of my knowledge has never spoken about working on the film, sells the idea with youthful conviction.  But the effects Argento uses to execute what should be the standout bug attack scenes are about on par with The Swarm produced 10 years earlier...and considered pretty crappy even then.

 

So what’s with the film's enduring appeal...or at least an explanation for Synapse's beautiful new two-disc 4K Ultra HD release?  Part of it is the novelty of seeing Connelly, an Academy Award winning actress, dabbling in the horror genre for the first time (she'd also turn up in Dark City and Dark Water later in her career).  But it all comes down to Argento's inventiveness behind the camera, resulting in some nail-biting Hitchcockian suspense (particularly the opening murder sequence) and over-the-top violence.  This is marred at times by the use of a heavy metal soundtrack (that’s ironically now a kitschy throwback) overwhelming an altogether brilliant new score by Goblin.  For pure imagery, Phenomena remains a rich textural landscape of dream logic and nightmare fuel.  The fact that it's script is a laughable mess is almost an afterthought.

 

Synapse Films' new Blu-ray set goes all out with new 4K transfers of all three release versions, including the 116-minute Italian cut, International cut, and 83-minute U.S. release of Creepers.  New material often pops up with Italian subtitles for those sections without English dubbing.   But it all looks terrific across the board no matter which version you choose, making for a prominent upgrade over Synapse’s previous Blu-ray…which already looked terrific to begin with!  With Lossless Mater Audio and accompanying 2.0 stereo soundtracks remastered from the original elements, tech heads will be in Argento heaven.

 

Extras include two audio commentaries ,a feature-length 2017 documentary, visual essay on the alternate cuts, music videos, radio spots and sweet new slipcover.  Collectors will note the absence of several featurettes, videos from previous releases, so it's not a total swap out...but it's one hell of a presentational upgrade in every way.

    

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