Deep Red

Deep Red
File:Deepredfilmposter.jpg English-title theatrical release poster
Directed by	Dario Argento
Written by	Dario Argento Bernardino Zapponi
Produced by	Claudio Argento Salvatore Argento
Starring	Macha Meril David Hemmings Daria Nicolodi Gabriele Lavia Giuliana Calandra Glauco Mauri Clara Calamai Piero Mazzinghi
Cinematography	Luigi Kuveiller
Edited by	Franco Fraticelli
Music by	Goblin Giorgio Gaslini
Production companies	Rizzoli Film Seda Spettacoli
Release date	7 March 1975 (Italy)
Running time	126 minutes
Country	Italy
Language	Italian
Box office	₤3,709,723,000 (Italy) $629,903 (United States)

Deep Red (original title Profondo rosso; also known as The Hatchet Murders) is a 1975 Italian giallo film, directed by Dario Argento and co-written by Argento and Bernardino Zapponi. It was released on 7 March 1975. It was produced by Claudio and Salvatore Argento, and the film's score was composed and performed by Goblin. It stars Macha Meril as a medium and David Hemmings as a man who investigates a series of murders performed by a mysterious figure wielding a hatchet.

Although the film was not a financial success internationally, it met with critical acclaim and is the most well-known giallo film to date.

Plot

The film follows music teacher Marcus Daly (Hemmings) as he investigates the violent murder of psychic medium Helga Ulmann (Macha Meril), which he witnesses in an apartment building. Other major characters are introduced early, including Daly's friend Carlo (Gabriele Lavia), Ulmann's associate Dr. Giordani (Glauco Mauri) and reporter Gianna Brezzi (Daria Nicolodi).

After his attempt to rescue the medium fails, Daly realizes he has seen a certain painting among a group of portraits on the wall of the victim's apartment, but it seems to have disappeared when the police arrive. Later in the film, he also initially overlooks another clue that causes him to discover a mouldering corpse walled up in a derelict house. One murder leads to a series of others as Daly's obsession with this vital clue that he fails to understand endangers his life and that of everyone with whom he comes into contact. Among those killed are Giordani, Amanda Righetti (Giuliana Calandra) and Carlo.

The killing of Helga Ulmann is prefaced by a child's doggerel tune, the same music that accompanies the film's opening sequence in which two shadowy figures struggle until one of them is stabbed to death. The music serves as the murderer's calling card. When Daly hears it in his own apartment soon after becoming involved in the case he is able to foil his attacker. Later, he plays the tune to Giordani, a psychiatrist, who theorizes that the music is important because it probably played an integral part in a traumatic event in the killer's past. The doctor's theory is of course correct, as the identity of the killer is finally revealed as Carlo's insane mother Martha (Clara Calamai). When Carlo was still a child, he watched as she murdered her husband when he tried to have her committed to a mental hospital, then entomb his body in a room of their house. Daly's discovery of the corpse is one of the film's most dramatic moments.

In the climax, Martha confronts Marcus and tries to kill him. Wielding a butchering knife, Martha chases him around the complex and into a room with an elevator. Marcus is stabbed in the shoulder by the knife, and kicks Martha toward the elevator shaft. A long necklace she wears catches in the bars of the shaft, and she is decapitated when Daly summons the lift. The film ends with Daly staring into the resultant pool of blood.

Cast

• Macha Méril as Helga Ulmann
• Clara Calamai as Martha (the killer)
• David Hemmings as Marcus Daly
• Daria Nicolodi as Gianna Brezzi
• Gabriele Lavia as Carlo
• Eros Pagni as Supt. Calcabrini
• Giuliana Calandra as Amanda Righetti
• Piero Mazzinghi as Bardi
• Glauco Mauri as Prof. Giordani
• Aldo Bonamano as Carlo's father
• Liana Del Balzo as Elvira
• Vittorio Fanfoni as Cop taking notes
• Dante Fioretti as Police photographer
• Geraldine Hooper as Massimo Ricci
• Jacopo Mariani as Young Carlo (as Iacopo Mariani)
• Nicoletta Elmi as Olga

Background

Deep Red was shot mainly on location in Turin, Italy, a "magical" city according to Argento, in sixteen weeks. The main reason why he chose Turin was because at the time there were more practicing Satanists in Turin than in any other European city, excluding Lyon.

The film's special effects, which include several mechanically-operated heads and body parts, were made and executed by Carlo Rambaldi, best known for creating the extraterrestrial protagonist of Steven Spielberg's E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, for which he won an Academy Award in 1983.

Co-writer Bernardino Zapponi said the inspiration for the murder scenes came from Argento and himself thinking of painful injuries to which the audience could relate. Basically, not everyone knows the pain of being shot by a gun, but almost everyone has at some point accidentally struck furniture or been scalded by hot water. The closeup shots of the killer's hands, clad in black leather gloves, were performed by director Dario Argento himself.

Release

Critical reception

Deep Red has been very well received by critics. It currently holds a 100% approval rating on movie review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes based on twenty-two reviews.

The A.V. Club wrote, "Operating under the principle that a moving camera is always better than a static one, and not above throwing in a terrifying evil doll, Deep Red showcases the technical bravado and loopy shock tactics that made Argento famous." AllMovie called it "the master work in Italian horror maestro Dario Argento's canon".

Home video

Multiple versions of the film exist on DVD and VHS, in large part due to the fact that Argento removed twenty-six minutes (largely scenes between Nicolodi and Hemmings) from the film, footage that was never dubbed in English. For years, it was assumed that the film's American distributors were responsible for removing said scenes, but the recent Blu-ray release confirmed that Argento oversaw and approved the edits to the film.

Eleven seconds of cuts made to the film by the BBFC in 1993 were waived when the film was re-submitted in 2005.

In 1999, Anchor Bay acquired the rights to release the film uncut, on both DVD and VHS. Their version restored the missing footage, but kept the American end credit scene (a freeze frame shot of Hemmings looking down upon a pool of blood). As there was no dubbed versions of the missing scenes, the scenes (and additional dialogue omitted in the dubbed version) were featured in their original Italian language. The DVD offered both English and Italian audio tracks as well.

Blue Underground obtained the rights to the film in 2008 and released it as a standard DVD. Their Blu-ray release, released in 2011, contains the US version of the film (which is referred to as "The Director's Cut") and the original edit (referred as "Uncut", and contains option to watch it in either language).

Soundtrack

Main article: Profondo Rosso (soundtrack)

Argento originally contacted jazz pianist and composer Giorgio Gaslini to score the film. However, he was unhappy with Gaslini's output, deeming it "awful". Gaslini, frustrated by Argento's dictatorially insistent requests, effectively walked out of the film when Argento interrupted a recording session because the music sounded too chaotic to him. After failing to get Pink Floyd to replace Gaslini, Argento turned back to Italy and found Goblin, a talented local progressive rock band. Their leader, Claudio Simonetti, produced two compositions within just one night. Argento, impressed, signed them immediately, and they ended up composing most of the film's musical score (three Gaslini compositions were retained in the final version). Subsequently, Goblin composed music for several other films by Dario Argento.

Alternate versions

• The original Italian version is 126 minutes long. Most US versions remove 22 minutes worth of footage, including most graphic violence, all humorous scenes, almost all of the romantic scenes between David Hemmings and Daria Nicolodi and part of the subplot regarding the house of the screaming child.
• The US video release by Anchor Bay Entertainment is mostly restored, reinstating gore shots and scenes with dialogue that were cut from the initial US release. It was likely that these scenes were cut before the English dub was prepared, and so they now only exist with an Italian dub (English subtitles are provided for these scenes). However, in the original theatrical version, the end credits are displayed over a shot of Marcus's reflection in a pool of blood. The image is moving (blood drips into the pool, Hemming's face changes expression etc.) while the credits are displayed. Anchor Bay's release features the credits over a freeze-frame of the original shot. Other than this change, the Anchor Bay VHS/DVD is the full uncut version of the film.
• The later DVD release from Blue Underground is the exact version mentioned above. Also, Blue Underground released an "Uncensored English Version" on DVD on 17 May 2011. This cut of the film runs no more than 105 minutes, with the gore from the original Italian version intact but the other cuts from the edited English version again excised.
• The original UK Redemption video release was cut by 11 seconds to remove scenes of two dogs fighting and a live lizard impaled with a pin. The 2005 Platinum DVD issue is slightly re-framed (to exclude the lizard scene) and restores the dog sequence, as it seems likely that they are playing rather than fighting.
• The full-length Italian version (with English subtitles and one small cut by UK censors) is available on video in the UK in pan and scan format from Redemption Films. The only known widescreen print of this version can be found in Australia on both SBS TV and its pay-TV channel World Movies, completely uncut. Note that the widescreen laserdisc release is in English language and was cut by director Argento himself by about 12 minutes.

Remake

In 2010 George A. Romero was contacted by Claudio Argento to direct a 3D remake of Deep Red which Claudio said would also involve Dario. Romero showed some interest in the film; however, after contacting Dario, who said he knew nothing about the remake, Romero declined Claudio's offer. It is unknown if Claudio will look elsewhere for a director or still has plans to remake his brother's film.

External links

• Deep Red at IMDb
• Deep Red is available for free viewing and download at the Internet Archive (Note that this version is the 98 minute [101 minutes with credits] edited U.S. theatrical version, also known as The Hatchet Murders. It does, however, contain the original ending credits shot that has been freeze-framed on the Anchor Bay Entertainment and Blue Underground releases.)
• MP3 commentary by dvdtalk.co.uk critic Michael Mackenzie