Stendhal Syndrome, The (1996) [Blu-ray]
Drama | Horror | Mystery | Thriller

When beautiful police detective Anna Manni follows the bloody trail of a sophisticated serial murderer/rapist through the streets of Italy, the young woman falls victim to the bizarre "Stendhal Syndrome" - a hallucinatory phenomenon which causes her to lose her mind and memory in the presence of powerful works of art. Trapped in this twilight realm, Anna plunges deeper and deeper into sexual psychosis, until she comes to know the killer's madness more intimately than she ever imagined. Horror maestro Dario Argento (Suspiria, Opera) reaches new heights of florid fantasy and Grand Guignol with this warped work of art starring Maxim Magazine's "Sexiest Woman in the World" Asia Argento (Land Of The Dead, XXX), Thomas Kretschmann (King Kong, Blade II) and Marco Leonardi (From Dusk Till Dawn 3). Previously edited outside of Italy, The Stendhal Syndrome is now presented here in stunning High Definition, transferred under the supervision of cinematographer Giuseppe Rotunno (All That Jazz, Amarcord) from the original Italian 35mm interpositive, and loaded with exclusive Extras.

User Comment: matthew wilder (picqueur@aol.com) from los angeles, 5 June 1999 • What makes up the singular pleasure that is Dario Argento? Maybe it's the crossroads where High Romanticism and hardcore porn meet. (I'm referring to the feeling of his work--not the images.) Argento seems doomed, like Peckinpah and like Lynch, to have summed up his world-view in a single masterpiece, the 1977 SUSPIRIA; the thrillers that came before and the low-budget shockers that came after may offer delights, but nothing close to that unity of vision.

Seeing THE STENDHAL SYNDROME projected in Los Angeles, I was struck with newfound sympathy for the Star Wars fans protesting way too much in favor of THE PHANTOM MENACE. If you love THE STENDHAL SYNDROME, you love Argento, and that is that--you may see the flaws, but they don't ruin your pleasure. The picture has too many Achilles heels to enumerate here, but what's important is that nobody in world cinema today is wrestling with his soul in the psychosexual mire the way Argento does. He puts his misogynistic demons and his almost sentimental compassion right out there; and only Cronenberg has such a direct pipeline to his own unconscious. Not to mention the fabulous, cascading images--Argento's stock-in-trade is Victorian Liebestod, Edward Gorey gone porno, and THE STENDHAL SYNDROME has sequences that rank with his best.

The sketchy thing about STENDHAL SYNDROME, like the maestro's TRAUMA, is his use of his daughter, Asia Argento, in scenes one cannot imagine a father watching, much less filming. Whatever memoirs come down the pike twenty years later, it must be said: Argento for certain lets it all hang out, and the land-mined terrain he maps is, to my taste, thrilling.

Summary: Through the looking-glass darkly.

User Comment: (dennis70) from Trieste, 7 March 2005 • Regarded as one of Argento's lesser works, I find this one much more plausible than any of his early films. Let's face it, Argento doesn't care much about plot or even acting. His films are probably the frustrating I've ever seen: There are things I love, and things I hate about them. I grew up watching much of his films mutilated by Italian Television. I was a kid back then, and strangely enough his films never scared me when they were supposed to. They were really over the top. But I loved the colours, the pictures and once in a while I found myself humming Claudio Simonetti's electronic scores.

Now with this film Argento has Morricone, who is definitely a master and he does a great job here. Anna's character is really intriguing. Some people dismiss Asia's acting style, but I think it goes very well with her father's aesthetics. You wont find the crazy colours here. Everything is more restrained. The opening for example scene is great. But the film looses interest towards the end. Still I think is one of Argento's most solid pieces. The idea is truly interesting and Anna's relationship with the killer is fascinating. The hallucinations scenes of Anna going into the paintings are masterfully done.

After the huge disappointment of Il Cartaio, I hope he truly returns to form, and start doing what he's good at: Going crazy with film. La Sindrome Di Stendhal is a pretty good step.

Summary: Pretty solid.

[CSW] -2- Sorry but I just didn't buy into the type of madness this movie tried to present. I also thought it had B rate acting and C rate cinematography. The huge but fleeting glimpses of great art seemed to me to be the high points and although I expected brief nudity to accent the psychosexual horror aspect of the plot there was none. I didn't leave this movie with my suspension-of-disbelief intact although I tried hard to believe in the plot.
[V4.0-A3.5] MPEG-4 AVC - No D-Box.

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