December 1, 2006: Dario Argento's Pelts
My fellow horror fiends, I apologize for the late posting. Between my city's first-ever-in-history blizzard last week and a trip to the ER (I'm fine now, no worries), I've been a bit behind. While recovering over the past weekend and attempting to stay warm,
Dario Argento's fur-fringed
Masters of Horror episode,
Pelts, seemed a fitting theme.
I haven't held back from admitting that so far, I've been underwhelmed and disappointed with
Masters of Horror this season. Knowing that Italy's horror maestro Dario Argento was up next, I still had some hope for the rest of the season, yet I also cringed because I wasn't too fond of his season 1 episode,
Jenifer. One of the main reasons I didn't like
Jenifer was that Argento departed from his trademark style to try a grittier perspective, and I just didn't feel that it worked. The Showtime website synopsis for
Pelts did indicate that Argento would be returning to his legendary vividly colored, operatic style, so that was encouraging.
Well, Giallo gods be praised, Dario Argento managed to raise the bar and inject some actual
potential into this season.
Pelts contains all of the flourishes that made me fall in love with Argento's work the first time I saw his masterpiece
Suspiria. It's mystical, perverse, artistically gory, gorgeously photographed and perfectly scored. I especially smiled upon seeing composer Claudio Simonetti's name in the opening credits, since he and Argento are basically the Italian parallel of director
Tim Burton and composer
Danny Elfman; when they work together, it's pure magic. In the music of
Pelts, Simonetti accentuates his trademark Gothic-tinged atmospheres with Middle Eastern instruments and scales, perfectly stirring the primal pot of the story's ancient occult lore.
Unlike most of this season's episodes,
Pelts finally provides a strong foundation for Argento's mastery: an interesting story. The human characters, particularly
Meat Loaf as the lecherous, slave-driving fur trader, and
John Saxon as the booze-soaked hick trapper, are broad-stroked, dirty and disgusting, but also riveting to watch. At the heart of it all, the story's magic transcends
Pelts beyond cookie-cutter horror and into significant filmmaking. The lesser, yet evolved characters - the raccoons themselves and their silver-tipped, magical pelts - are hypnotically filmed, and the brutality of the humans' (very creative) deaths has a thought-provoking purpose, not simply a way to serve up carnage points. Just like any significant work of horror,
Pelts explores social themes, which, unlike earlier MoH episode
Pro-Life, are actually subtle and provocative. When the episode ended, I said to HHH (horror-hound hubby), "Wow, talk about an effective 'anti-fur' campaign!" However, I didn't feel preached to; I felt disgusted, moved and challenged. That's what horror will do when a true master of the genre has taken the wheel.
