The Bird with the Crystal Plumage

Dir: Dario Argento

1970

*****

Dario Argento’s 1970 masterpiece The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is a landmark film in Italian Giallo cinema and is the first installment in the Animal Trilogy which was followed by The Cat o' Nine Tails and Four Flies on Grey Velvet. While it wasn’t the first Giallo film, it was the film that really got the genre notice, indeed, if you understand and love The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, then you know and love Giallo. Giallo is an Italian thriller/horror genre of both literature and film. It always has to include mystery or detective elements and often contains slasher, crime fiction, psychological thriller, psychological horror, exploitation, sexploitation and, less frequently, supernatural horror elements. The word giallo is Italian for yellow. The term derives from a series of cheap paperback mystery novels with yellow covers that were popular in post-fascist Italy. The film subgenre began as literal adaptations of the giallo mystery novels. Directors soon began taking advantage of modern cinematic techniques to create a unique genre that retained the mystery and crime fiction elements of giallo novels but veered more closely into the horror and psychological thriller or psychological horror genres. Many of the typical characteristics of these films were incorporated into the later American slasher sub-genre. Written by Argento, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage is an uncredited adaptation of Fredric Brown's novel The Screaming Mimi, which had previously been made into a Hollywood film, Screaming Mimi in 1958 directed by Gerd Oswald. The story follows Sam Dalmas (Tony Musante) who is an American writer holidaying in Rome with his English model girlfriend Julia (Suzy Kendall). Suffering from writer's block, Sam is on the verge of returning to America, but witnesses the attack of a woman in an art gallery by a mysterious black-gloved assailant dressed in a raincoat. Attempting to reach her, Sam is trapped between two mechanically-operated glass doors and can only watch as the villain makes his escape. The woman, Monica Ranieri (Eva Renzi), the wife of the gallery's owner, Alberto Ranieri (Umberto Raho), survives the attack and the local police confiscates Sam's passport to stop him from leaving the country; the assailant is believed to be a serial killer who is killing young women across the city, and Sam is an important witness. Sam is haunted by what he saw that night, feeling sure that some vital clue is evading him, and he decides to help Inspector Morosini (Enrico Maria Salerno) in his investigation. He interviews the pimp of a murdered prostitute and visits a shop where another of the murdered women worked. There, he finds that the last thing she sold on the day she was murdered was a painting of a stark landscape featuring a man in a raincoat murdering a young woman. He visits the artist, but finds only another dead end. As he makes his way back to his apartment, Julia is attacked by the same black-gloved figure, but Sam arrives home just in time to save her and the assailant escapes. Sam starts to receive menacing phone calls from the killer, from which the police manage to isolate an odd cricketing noise in the background, which is later revealed to be the call of a rare breed of bird from Siberia, called "The Bird with Crystal Plumage" due to the diaphanous glint of its feathers. This proves important since the only one of its kind in Rome is kept in the Italian capital's zoo, allowing Sam and the police to identify the killer's abode. There they once again find Monica Ranieri, this time struggling with her husband, Alberto, who is wielding a knife. After a short struggle, Alberto is dropped from six stories onto a concrete sidewalk below. As he dies, he confesses to the murders and tells them he loves his wife. Finding that Julia and Monica have run off, Sam goes after them, eventually coming to a darkened building. There he finds his friend Garullo (Gildo Di Marco) murdered and Julia bound, gagged and wounded. The assailant emerges and is revealed as Monica Ranieri. Sam suddenly realises that he didn't actually miss anything during the first attack; he simply misinterpreted what he saw: the attack he witnessed in the gallery was not Monica being assaulted but rather Monica attacking her husband, who was wearing the raincoat. She flees and he pursues her to her art gallery. There, he is trapped, pinned to the floor by the release of a wall-sized sculpture of wire and metal. Unable to free himself, he becomes the prey of the person he was pursuing. This climax to the mystery, with strong sado-masochistic elements, has the knife-wielding Monica teasing Sam as she prepares to kill him. As she raises her knife, the police (who were notified by Julia, who had escaped) burst in and apprehend her. Sam is freed and Monica is taken to a psychiatric hospital. The victim of a traumatic attack ten years before, seeing the painting of the murdered girl drove her mad, causing her to identify not with the victim but with the assailant. Alberto likewise suffered from an induced psychosis, helping her to cover up the murders and committing some himself. Sam and Julia are re-united and return to America. It is one hell of a debut and the first of many great films from the legendary horror director. The film was popular too, clearly influenced by the films of Alfred Hitchcock but with a edge about them. Argento has been known as "The Italian Hitchcock" ever since. The acting was superb and Tony Musante was a very intense actor. He would frequently show up at Argento's apartment at 3am to discuss characterization, much to Argento's annoyance, but his enthusiasm comes through clearly in the film. No one quite expected the success of the film at the time and at one point an executive producer wanted Argento removed from the production when he was disappointed by a screening of some dailies. When Argento's father Salvatore Argento went to the exec's office to talk to him he found the exec's secretary visibly shaken. When he asked the secretary what was troubling her she said she saw the screening and the footage terrified her. Salvatore Argento then asked her to go tell her boss about her reaction to the screening. She convinced the executive to keep Dario Argento on as director. It is a terrifying film but not because of what you see, rather what you don’t see. This technique has been used many times but rarely as effective as seen here. The suspense is almost excruciating but always thrilling, it is one of those films that really opened my eyes as a film fan when I first saw it and introduced me to a whole new world of amazing film making. Neither thriller or horror had looked as good, been as well performed or had been as intense before. It’s one of those classic films that exceeds it’s own hype and I feel the same way about it on repeat viewings then I did when I first saw it, which is a rare occurrence. It’s faultless.