To me, this movie is perfection.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

"Deep Red" stars Blow-Up's David Hemmings as a music professor who investigates a series of murders. The film has a famous and influential score by the band 'Goblin.' Argento had originally contracted jazz composer Giorgio Gaslini (Antonioni's La Notte, 1961), to score but was dissatisfied with the results. Failing to secure Pink Floyd (Antonioni's Zabriskie Point, 1970), he discovered Goblin. The score is the perfect complement to Argento's visuals; a recurring lullaby from the killer's troubled past develops to gutsy organ rock as the story progresses. Written by Argento and Bernardino Zapponi (frequent Fellini scribe), Zapponi stated the inspiration for the murders sprung from discussions about what were the most painful injuries that an audience could relate too. Almost everyone has at some point accidentally struck furniture or been scalded by hot water, but not many have experienced being shot. An arresting credit sequence grabs the attention; the menacing score is alternated with the sounds of a child's melody. A murder is committed (suggested by shadows) in a room on Christmas Day, a bloodied knife falls to the floor and a child's feet step into the frame. Cut! Argento zooms in on Marcus after an unsatisfying band rehearsal; "Maybe a little too good. Too clean. Yes, too precise. Too… formal. It should be more… trashy. See what I mean? Remember that this sort of jazz came out of the brothels." This is perhaps the first instance of 'self-reflexivity' in Argento's films. However before Marcus can even finish this speech, Argento tracks into a room where a parapsychology conference is taking place. At the conference Giordani's discussion on telepathy in animals' is little more than the pseudo- science from his 'Four Flies On Grey Velvet' (prefiguring themes to appear later in Phenomena). Argento, formally completing the opening sequence, zooms out of the conference where the door's surrounding red drapes close before the camera. This succession of shots tracking and zooming in on subjects creates an unsettling mood.Later, Marc catches sight of what seems to be a strange painting in the hall of a murdered woman's apartment. It transpires that the painting was a mirror in which the face of the murderer was reflected, and this is how Marc's ability to see is brought into question. Images aren't always 'fixed,' what Argento presents is a world of visual indeterminacy.Marcus walks past the bar where Carlo works as a musician, which Argento bases on Edward Hopper's painting "Nighthawks" (1942). It draws attention to the fact these eerily empty streets are not realistic. Here Marcus and Carlo have the discussion; "…maybe the painting was made to disappear, because it represented something important." At the crime scene, Marcus is introduced to a bubbly reporter, Gianna who publishes his picture in the local newspaper, setting in motion the killer's pursuit of Marcus. Throughout the film, Argento challenges Marcus's masculinity through a series of farcical encounters with Gianna.Looking for Carlo, Marcus locates him at his lover Massimo's apartment. Carlo's secret is out and he's clearly resentful. Carlo declares; "Good old Carlo, he's not only a drunk but a 'faggot' as well." Since Marcus is so used to having his masculinity called into question, he doesn't seem to react to Carlo's secret. Gay characters frequently appear in Argento films, however since Argento suspects everyone equally, they're rarely revealed to be the murderers.A classic 'Giallo' set piece begins with the creepy ornament of a toy baby hanging from a rope. Soon the lights go out and a ladies birds turn against her. The killer fills a hot bathtub and gives the woman a sadistic scalding. Falling to the floor she scribbles with her finger a note on her steam-coated walls. Later, Giordani arrives at the house where he meets the maid, who cleans the blood off the bathroom sink. The anticipation is agonising waiting for Giordani to find the message. Finally the bathroom fills with hot steam and the message on the wall reappears: "IT WAS." As if this anticipation weren't gruelling enough, Argento continues to leave us in the dark.Playing around with Antonioni's Blow-Up, where the truth was inscribed in a photograph of a potential crime scene; truth in Deep Red is stamped in the memory of Marcus. Marcus solves the identity of the film's murderer as he makes one final trip down the hall of the first crime scene, where what was first thought to be a missing painting was in fact the killer's reflection in a mirror. Marcus makes the final connection just as he turns to greet the killer… In the last shot Marcus is forced to stare at his reflection in a pool of her blood emphasising the 'relentlessness of the gaze' and the importance of 'looking' in order to get at the truth.Deep Red was Argento's first full-fledged masterpiece, a thriller where Argento transcended the trashy material with the remarkable formalism of his camera. He also performs some remarkable visual flourishes; tracking shots and edits such as subjective POV to sudden-close up's, that make Deep Red linger in the memory.

I've always had something of a problem with this, held by many, to be Argento's finest film, in all the various forms I have seen it. Sparkling Blu-ray with subtitled sections replacing lost English language sections , was wonderful to look at but took some getting used to, with the continuous Italian/English language switching. Particularly unfortunate with David Hemmings, who has never convinced me in this role, because his performance seems so lacklustre and then in the Italian dub sections he sounds really lively. I don't know if it because the killing scenes are so good but it appears that Argento was so preoccupied with these and found the intervening scenes too boring to take as much trouble with. Again it could be down to Hemmings' rather lumpen performance. There are better gialli than this and in my opinion several better Argento but it is an essential view.

I preferred Dario Argento's Phenomena and Suspiria to this, but Profondo rosso was still a driving, intriguing thriller. It has that Italian giallo charm and has a fantastical and dreamlike feel to it.The scenes are often shot in unusual angles and go on longer than you'd expect, and also the lines sometimes don't really seem to make much sense, evoking a sense of bizarre uncomfortability. By the end of the film you're completely immersed in its world.The performances are pretty good. I thought our protagonist, played by David Hemmings, was a bit wooden. The locations and the music are top notch. The film was originally shot in Italian so that's the language I recommend watching it in.By modern standards the gore scenes look pretty fake, and amusingly enough the blood itself is very brightly colored (in contrast to the film's title.)

Deep Red (1975) *** 1/2 (out of 4) -126 minute cut*** (out of 4) -105 minute English version Dario Argento's giallo about a musician (David Hemmings) in Italy who witnesses a woman get brutally murdered so he teams up with a journalist (Daria Nicolodi) to try and find out who the maniac is. DEEP RED, or PROFONDO ROSSO if you prefer, is certainly one of the most popular giallo films ever made but I think the quality of it is going to depend on which version you watch. Obviously the original American cut under THE HATCHET MURDERS title should be avoided since it loses nearly thirty-minutes worth of footage plus the majority of the gore. The 126-minute directors cut is actually the best version but for this review I watched the recently released "uncut English version," which clocks in at 105-minutes and features all the gore. I thought I'd enjoy this version the most but I must admit that the back-and-forth between Hemmings and Nicolodi was actually fun and with it missing here there's just a certain charm that the film is missing. The majority of the footage missing in this version is the back-and-forth flirting between the two and some character development. I know several people prefer this version but I think I'll go with the longer version on future viewings. As for the film, there's no question that it's a work of art as Argento's style is certainly at the top of his game and especially the magnificent cinematography. I especially love all the close-up scans of the floor where we see various items including the now somewhat legendary doll. There's also the masterful score from Goblin, which is just downright perfect and really sets the mood and atmosphere for the entire picture. Then there's the violence, which is certainly shocking at times but this is just Argento all the way. Both Hemmings and Nicolodi actually turn in good performances and they help carry the picture even when the story isn't the strongest. DEEP RED certainly deserves its reputation as one of the better giallo films out there but pick your version carefully.