All language subtitles for Dario.Argento.Panico.2023.720p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-FLUX.Hi

♪

♪

He's more like an

like a painter or a
musician, you know?

But he uses film as his medium.

♪

His murders and his savagery

and his sense of malignancy
is out of control.

But his camera work
and his storytelling

is completely controlled.

♪

- Careful, I'm moving it down ok?
- Yes yes.

Shhh!

On the other side.

Attilio try to turn
further, to the other side.

I'll go from below,
you from above.

When there are no dogs.

Leaves, leaves,
shake the leaves.

- Nice?
- Good!

We cross the leaves like a
person passing through them.

Ready? Go!

But what is Dario
Argento's fear?

In short, I'm afraid
of many things.

And the biggest fear
you have right now?

Yes, yes, I'm really scared that's
why I also work on holidays.

There are only a few days
left until the movie starts

and I'm afraid of the film.

This movie is like a person

like a bride I have to meet and
I'm afraid of being rejected

but then she never rejects me

I have this little fear.

Do you feel the wind?

♪

♪

But how long have
we been in the car?

Well, it's almost an hour.

Couldn't we find a
place closer to home!?

Maybe here in the countryside you
can isolate yourself a little more.

[Insects chirping]

♪

Hello Maestro, welcome!

Good morning.

Come and let me introduce
you to the hotel staff.

- Good evening. Ilaria.
- Good evening.

- Good evening. Luce.
- Good evening.

Good evening, darling.

- Good evening. Jaime.
- Good evening.

Please, I'll show you the way.

We set up a small
welcome buffet.

Thank you.

♪

My mom was Elda Luxardo

who was a very
famous photographer

of the 40s, 50s, and 60s.

She was specialized in
showing the beauty of women.

My school was very close

to my mother's studio

so after school I
always went there.

She photographed the
divas of the time

like Loren, Lollobrigida

all these amazing beauties.

And I was there in a
corner of the dressing room

where they put on their
makeup and dressed up

I stayed there doing my homework

but I looked, I saw, I saw

how they put on their make-up

I still have the sweetish
smell of make-up in my nose.

Then when I found myself
on set for the first time

I immediately saw that I knew how to
show the female figure in the best way.

Women, girls are very
important in my movies

because I remember how
my mother depicted them

how she elevated them.

♪

I start the film in seven
days and in the last days

there are no Sundays...
Look how cute she is.

- She is nice!
- Sweet isn't she?

What do you like the most about
a woman? What strikes you?

The face!

I find his movies entertaining.

You don't watch them
to get sexually aroused

you watch them because, you know,
they are exciting and effervescent.

They leave you with a little
tachycardia which isn't that intense

which is neither nonsexual
nor necessarily sexual.

There is pure excitement like
the one experienced by a kid

who discovers coca cola for
the first time and wants more.

You watch Dario's movies, with screaming
women, whether it's through a cinema scope

or not, in extremely bright colors,
with all those hands covered with gloves

and it's beautiful, it's exciting
and you just want to watch more.

FLORIANA: [Speaking Italian]

Our house was all about cinema.

My mom was a successful
stars' photographer.

My dad was a
manager at Unitalia.

In the distribution of
Italian films abroad.

Dad was friend
with the producers.

He traveled with Gina
Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren

who then met my mother.

Our world was cinema,
directors, actors

photographers.

It was everywhere, these
were our friends were those.

I was a kid

I was on holiday in the
Dolomites, with my family

and one evening we went to

a theatre that was in town.

They were screening.

"The Phantom of the
Opera" with Claude Rains.

And I was moved, I
liked that film a lot.

It revealed to me some parts
of the soul that I didn't know

even a certain sick love that
I didn't know could exist.

That was the first time

that I experienced
those feelings.

My mum

didn't have, let's say,
a regular childhood.

Her dad was a very
adventurous man.

He liked to go to
the centre of Brazil

and had no qualms about
taking his family with him.

So no one knows where my mum was
born, she was born somewhere.

So when she was very little

she had misadventures
with poisonous spiders.

This was her childhood

and this had an impact
on Dario's upbringing.

During the war in 1941
with Dario newborn

she took newborn Dario to see
his father who was in Slovenia

on the battlefields

because she didn't want to
leave her husband alone,

the passion was too strong.

ASIA: [Speaking Italian]

My grandmother didn't like
to talk about her work.

She was a great artist, but after she
became a mom she put her job away.

Maybe regretfully and she
never talked about it.

When we asked her "Grandma take
a family photo" she refused.

When we took
pictures all together

she struck crazy poses, a
bit retro as her photos.

So she never taught me
anything about photography

however I observed her work a lot,
and I believe also my father did.

This almost supernatural
aesthetic sense

these chiaroscuro,
these mythological poses

it was such a perfect form of
aesthetic. It almost created complexes.

My dad has always
encouraged Dario to read

because the basis of
culture is reading.

My father's library was very
extensive, there were so many books

and I read a lot of them.

All books for grown-ups,
that I read as a kid instead.

What's going on Dario?
You look puzzled.

Where the fuck did you take me?

But why? It's a famous hotel
People come from all over Italy.

I hate famous hotels!

But everyone knows you
love to write in hotels.

I know, but I hate
famous hotels!

So you would not
write a movie here?

I don't know, maybe yes.

Can you please bring us
two fruit juices, please?

Of course.

Thank you.

COZZI: [Speaking Italian]

Since the father was
close to the film press,

when Dario finished his
studies, he sent him

as an apprentice to
"Giornale dello Spettacolo"

which was the official
Magazine of Italian cinema.

Then he worked for "Paese Sera"

but he was the assistant of
the assistant of the assistant.

So initially they sent him
to do the review of ballets

and things that weren't interesting
to anyone in the editorial team.

Dario Argento, director.

Argento, director for how long? Didn't
you start out as a film director?

No, I've been a sailor, so I've
sailed through many harbours.

I was a critic when
I was very young.

Then I wrote for cinema as a screenwriter
and I thought this would be my path

and I really liked this
solitary relationship

with the typewriter at home.

I loved it.

Marisa was my high
school classmate.

We studied together

and so one day we were both studying
at our school friend's house.

We were late

and so I asked Dario
if he could pick us up

because our friend's
house was far away.

I was a little annoyed I must say
because he stopped at Marisa's house

and he talked to her
for 15, 20 minutes

while I stood there
waiting for them.

PRODUCER: [Speaking Italian]

Why did you fall in
love with Dario Argento?

[Laughs]

Amazing!

I fell in love
with Dario Argento

because I could not do
otherwise, knowing him.

I was still in high school and
I was his sister's classmate.

That's how I met
him, we were friends

and so I had the
opportunity to know

her legendary brother who was
already working for a newspaper

and for the showbiz section!

So he had charm, for an
eighteen year old like me.

It was obvious that
I fell in love.

What surprised me was that
he fell in love with me!

♪

Yes, I'm leaving,
everything seems fine here.

Dario is starting to settle in.

Yes, yes, you know how he is

at first he hates having everyone
around, then slowly he relaxes.

The place is beautiful,
but it's terribly hot

but maybe you can also
take a swim in the pool

♪

"That Italian is
starting to worry me!"

That's what the master of
thrilling, Alfred Hitchcock, said

after seeing Dario
Argento's first movie!

His way of using the camera
has greatly influenced me.

It follows the detective who climbs
the stairs and reaches the top

and it turns on itself then it
follows him from behind again.

The camera tells so much!

Another one who influenced
me is Sergio Leone

with whom I wrote, together
with Bernardo Bertolucci.

"Once Upon a Time in the West".

I understood that him, who had
worked with the most famous

Italian and foreign
screenwriters,

having to make a movie where
the protagonist was a woman,

he thought that these
screenwriters of a certain age,

did not know women, they didn't
know how to describe women.

He wanted to get
some younger people

whom he thought were
more in tune with women

and understood them better.

We spent a long time
writing this film

but the female
character came out.

Also this one is kissable, she has nothing
traditional, she's modern and up-to-date.

For those who haven't
figured it out yet

we're on the set of "The
Bird with Crystal Plumage"

which is nothing more than
the title of a thriller movie

which is currently
being filmed in Rome.

Salerno, he certainly
doesn't need advice

instead he gives it to this
young man, a predestined victim.

Or maybe not, maybe
he is the murderer?

Mystery in a
thriller is mandatory

and director Dario Argento
remained very tightlipped.

Actually whether in art
galleries or outside, in the sky

very few birds with crystal
plumage have been seen so far

so for the curious ones we
will reveal the secret: Ready?

He was already established
in cinema as a screenwriter,

he had already written
some important screenplays

but directing is another thing,
it's all on your shoulders.

I remember I think the first day

I was not on the
set so I report it,

apparently he did not
shoot anything at all

because he was so nervous
that he just wanted to

get familiar with
the environment

and my father kept telling him
"Relax, don't worry, relax."

It was very emotional for Dario,
with no assistant director experience

but only this great culture of
movies, that he had watched,

analysed, reworked and discussed
with his friends and colleagues.

But afterward, he
carried on really fast.

Salvatore Argento, I have
a very dear memory of him,

because I worked with him a lot.

He was an extremely generous
man, extremely vital.

He knew everything about cinema.

He had already been a producer

before doing with Dario "The
Bird with the Crystal Plumage"

because no one at that time wanted
Dario to direct that screenplay.

They liked the script,
they wanted to buy it

but they didn't want
Dario as director.

Salvatore was always behind
every movie they made together.

He made the contracts,
negotiated, discussed

then the fights between him and
Dario were famous because the father

obviously had a budget,

he knew they could
not exceed it.

Dario, for certain reasons,
thought it was right to exceed it

to achieve a certain effect

and there were furious quarrels

but quarrels that lasted
no more than an hour.

[Woman screaming]

I think what Argento does is
he reinvents a lot of things

but adds new elements.

Obviously, he picks up
a lot of the strands

of where Mario Bava was
heading and where giallo was,

but he adds a more frenetic

and a more heretic
feel like it's a...

It combines it
fully with horror,

almost a cosmic sense of
an angry, evil universe.

You know, he... Everything
in Argento's movies

is trying to kill you.

I think Dario, as they
would say in "Scarface,"

gets high on his own supply.

You know, he... he really seems
to get a jolt out of the terror.

Perhaps a movie that isn't even a
giallo, for there is no suspense

nor mystery around
who the killer is

but mainly an erotic
representation

of men murdering women, is
"Peeping Tom" by Michael Powell.

In the aesthetic of the film,

you can spot many elements
belonging to "Peeping Tom"

while watching "The Bird
with the Crystal Plumage".

I remember a phone call

made with the old phones still
attached to the wall at home

with Sergio Corbucci, who was the
author of a subject called "Incubus"

which became the movie "The
Girl Who Knew Too Much"

after "The Bird with the
Crystal Plumage" came out

and was already a hit
at the box office.

Sergio, who was
a nice person too

asked my father.

"But that film is a bit
too similar to ours.

What are we going to do here?"

And my father told him "What
are we going to do with it?

It's a great movie,
ours went bad

let's be satisfied that there
is someone in Italian cinema

who manages to bring audience
to the kind of cinema we like".

When his first movie come out "The
Bird with the Crystal Plumage."

I was so terrified that I didn't
even remember what I had watched.

Yes, so my father watched
the film with Lombardo

and I didn't want to go

because I already knew that
Lombardo had negative thoughts.

And instead my father went
there, he watched the movie

and in the end everyone said.

"No, the movie isn't worth
it, it isn't worth it".

Because it was a
thriller different

from the other thrillers
seen up to that moment

which were very flat

instead this was bizarre

full of new ideas.

And then they all went up
in Lombardo's large studio.

On one side there was Lombardo's famous
secretary, her name was Cesarina.

She was eating a
sandwich for lunch

and her hands were shaking.

"What's up Cesarì?

Your hands are shaking!"

She says "The movie scared me,
It impressed me very much!"

Goffredo listened and told.

"She doesn't understand
anything about cinema."

When I first watched the movie

and I saw many people
entering the cinema,

I was proud, I was so
proud of my brother!

I felt important
to him, that's it!

♪

It's Dario Argento, the director
who opened up a new dimension

on the anguished world of fear.

[Man screaming]

[Explosions, siren wailing]

Dario himself told us how
much he had been frightened

by the bombing of Rome in 1943.

It traumatized him.

He probably remembered
it for long time

but in a certain sense, he
exorcised it immediately afterwards,

by talking about it

by scaring me when I was
a child in this big house.

[Wind whistling]

Fear has an abstract
meaning to me.

I make films that respect

my intimacy, my depths

but I don't know
what real fear is!

♪

When we watched movies when I was
little with my mother and father

I remember that
in suspense scenes

when maybe the killer
appeared from behind

my mother screamed!

So she scared us even more.

But the fact of being a coward

was not accepted.

We lived on the top floor of
a large aristocratic building.

He chased me into this big
house, therefore mostly dark

in dark corridors
etc. Scaring me

and then I ran
screaming "Please stop!"

He tested what could be scary.

Then when the film
had great success.

Lombardo called me and told me.

"We are very happy, we
have followed you so much,

we were always behind you!"

I didn't remind him

that he even wanted to replace
me halfway through the film.

1970, a film has caught
the world's attention

and it is in the US of Hitchcock,
the king of fear where it triumphed

with a 2-million box office success
in the first weeks of release.

The movie is "The Bird
with the Crystal Plumage"

by Dario Argento.

It had never happened
that an Italian film

was number one in
the US box office!

Another person who
completely changed his mind

was the main actor,
Tony Musante.

We argued throughout the film
from the first shot to the last.

He saw me as new, so he saw me
as someone who was not capable.

I worked in a strange way,
crooking the camera shots

all things he didn't like.

Before leaving

he even came to my house

and he wanted to hit me.

He knocked on the door.

"Dario Argento open the
door! Open the door!"

"Open the door! Open the door!"

Kicks on the door.

I remained silent, I thought.

Well, it's ten in the evening

I may have gone to the cinema.

I'm not at home

so you can hit as much as you want
against the door which is pretty sturdy.

Nothing will happen

and so finally he
got fed up and left.

The film was very successful
especially in America.

I got a call from Tony Musante

who told me.

“I am delighted, we had
great success together”.

And I told him "Look, that's
not true, that's not the story"

the story is we fought
throughout the film.

We didn't love
each other at all.”

The fashion for the Italian
thriller started from him

Dario Argento, 29 years
old, only two films

two animals, a bird and a
cat, two immediate successes.

Almost 3 billion gross.

Now Argento is shooting another film
that has four flies in the title.

I met Michael Brandon
in Los Angeles.

Something about him
fascinated me immediately.

He looked a lot like me!

"Four Flies on Grey
Velvet" is a film that

coincided with a first
crisis between us

a first crisis between us.

What I noticed was the incredible
resemblance of the protagonists

with us!

But

to what point does this
resemblance correspond to us?

Do you really think that

something hard, something
difficult could happen between us?

The question was
a bit like this.

When there was the first
screening of the film

my wife was there too.

At the end of the film she looked at me
and asked me "What have I done to you?"

For you to represent
me like this?”

But I hadn't thought at all
when I chose the actress

that she indeed
looked like my wife

in terms of
expressions, face, hair

in short, she really
looked like her!

But on the other hand we all get
inspired by our private lives

when making movies.

Once a magician I met in Turin

told me to put
animals in the title

I actually put it in the first
one because it was quite relevant

and then in the
second one I kept it.

And here it's actually almost more
pertinent than in the first one

because the resolution of the thriller
entitled "Four Flies on Grey Velvet"

entitled "Four Flies
on Grey Velvet"

is precisely in finding
out what this title means.

What you are about to see is the first of
the four films I've made for television

and it is also the first
meeting between you and me

because up to now my activity
has focused exclusively on cinema

Dario accepted the invitation
to work for television

because at the time the
Italian broadcasting company

had decided to
"rejuvenate" itself.

So when his work was
broadcast Rai was overwhelmed

with protests from quiet
people who had watched it

expecting a sequel to "Melissa"
or something like that

and had found themselves in
this sort of hellish nightmare.

We wrote this series with
Alfred Hitchcock's one in mind

"I think you have
to introduce it"

I told him I had seen
him acting many time.

I mean acting in real life.

And so his face became
very popular for a director

people usually only vaguely
knew how directors looked like.

They didn't know what they looked
like, popularity was given to actors.

We were pleased with

the success that has resulted
from the success of this project,

but

it also created moments when
we were overseen, stopped,

constantly harrassed.

It had become difficult to even go to
the supermarket to do the groceries.

Damn, it's really broken!

And what do I do now?!

Success is a bad
companion for a couple.

We understood this

and then we simply noted it.

With regret, but also
with the idea that.

"Okay, let's move on."

I think the case of “The Five Days”
is very telling of his artistic route.

He was trying to experiment

with something in
his poetic view.

Comedy is actually an
integral part of his work.

The fact that this was a
terrible flop was for him

I think, I wasn't born yet

cause of great suffering,
but also a warning.

He said to himself.

"Okay, I tried, but now I
have to stick to my genre."

Well, when we made "The Five
Days" he cared a lot about it

because several articles by
major Italian critics ended with.

"Pity that Dario Argento wastes his
time with these ridiculous giallos."

"He should use his talent
or more serious projects."

And Dario was indeed eager to show
that he was a versatile director.

In my opinion it
was this "failure"

of "The Five Days"
which brought him back

with a vengeance

in his "Deep Red".

♪

[Door closes, echoing]

When I was writing "Deep Red"
in a cottage in the countryside

without lights and without
anything, isolated, alone

I went there in the
morning at about 9am

and I only left in the
afternoon, at sunset.

Sometimes I was scared.

As I was digging really

into the depths of my soul

I had moments of fear

anguish, anxiety.

[Woman screaming]

♪

DEL TORO: "Deep Red" was
the first Argento I saw,

and what it was doing,

it was bringing all
the elements of giallo,

but it was much more stylish.

Here Argento moved the camera.

The camera became a character.

The camera moved. It was
very fluid, very playful.

It was sort of rephrasing
the mobility of the camera

on Hitchcock, you know?

At the same time, there are
so many things in "Deep Red"

that now make a big European
city feel ancient and evil.

It's not safe.

You see the environment,

you see the
Cinquecentos going by,

you see the beautiful
bars and restaurants,

the evocation of Hopper
with "Nighthawks,"

you know, there's all
these urban elements,

but underneath that, there
is a pagan savage thing

under the surface.

Building puzzles of different cities
for a movie, creating an imaginary city.

It was the right choice, a
great idea it seems trivial.

But it's the great idea that gave
a particular shine to his films.

Because they were Italian, but
not from a precise Italian city.

♪

SIMONETTI: [Speaking Italian]

When Argento had just
finished shooting "Deep Red"

he was working on the
soundtrack with Giorgio Gaslini

who had already collaborated
with him for "The Five Days".

But he wanted

a little more rock music

because Giorgio Gaslini was too
traditional with the orchestra.

So he said to the sound
engineer of the film

Carlo Bixio of Cinevox Record

that he wanted Pink
Floyd or Deep Purple.

♪

Carlo Bixio said to Dario.

“Why don't you listen to
these guys I'm producing?”

and Dario came to the studio and
he listened to our music and said.

"Here, they can fit!"

We have been quite disruptive

because we combined 70s rock

with a thriller movie, which
had never been done before.

[Wind blowing]

I had already made films that
had been extremely successful

but I thought I was
doing something different

something dreamlike,

something unrealistic.

Putting art

into a sort of great
mixer of styles.

There was the fascist
style of Turin

there was the art déco villa.

A big cauldron where I
put all my aspirations.

"Deep Red" was
released in theaters.

And it sold 1 million albums
in just the first ten months.

At the time the Gold Record
prize was 1 million albums

now all the discography put
together reaches 1 million.

Well those were different times!

So we held the record

of being perhaps the best-selling
album in the history of Italian music.

"Deep Red" sold more
than 4 million records!

[Wind blowing]

She was a woman with a
very strong character

very important

of great culture, she was
a very cultured person.

She inspired me in many things.

We travelled a lot together
during my trips around the world

she supported me.

We discovered the
Eastern civilizations

the Andean civilizations.

She has been very
important to me.

Then it finished,

on the other hand

everything ends sooner or later.

[Wind blowing]

How important has love
been in your life?

Well it's important
for everyone.

But I also think that in
this era that we are living,

love, the ancient
love, Dante's love

is no longer so powerful because
there are so many distractions

there is television,
you can travel easily.

Once people lived in small
houses with no light.

Only with candles, in the evening
it was cold people needed capes.

They fell ill easily and
they all had bad breath

because of stomach diseases.

They had toothaches and
there were no dentists.

So once upon a time,
love was the only thing

the only entertainment,
like a leisure.

Now there are many leisure activities.
There are discos where you can have fun,

you can travel, there are football matches
on television, there are video games.

In short, it has become less the
center of the universe, I think.

WOMAN: ♪ Roses are red ♪

♪ Violets are blue ♪

♪ But the iris is the flower ♪

That will mean the end of you!

♪

"Suspiria" is a bit

the elephant in the room

for my family and for my life.

Because my mother used to
tell one story about it

and my father another.

According to my
mother as we all know

it's a very personal story

it was my
great-grandmother's story.

Witchcraft

things that were definitely
part of my mother's universe.

I've never seen my father
studying the magical arts,

instead my mother had
a lot of books about it

it was definitely
my mother's subject.

[Man speaking Italian over PA]

♪

With "Suspiria" we have
truly created a genre

that cannot be said
to be inimitable

because it has been imitated
by many other musicians.

Let's say the real music,
the real Goblin sound

it's more like "Suspiria".

Screening, ready? Ready? Go!

It is the key that lets us know
where the teachers go every night!

I discovered it yesterday evening,
I wrote everything here next to you!

Susy you don't know
anything about witches!

We have experienced a
lot, we used ethnic tools,

we used bouzouki, the Indian
tabla, the Greek bouzouki.

NARRATOR: You can run
from "Suspiria"...

♪

Then I brought in a big Moog

to make electronic music

in short, it was a
very avant-garde work.

Still today when I listen to it,

we were way ahead!

♪

But I know this situation,

has been the beginning of the
end of my parents' relationship.

This son "Suspiria"
which belongs to both,

it was a film, a child
they had made together.

Son of a great love
and a great passion.

But in my opinion
the thing was that

my mother was supposed to play
the main character, I think eh!

My mother talked about it a lot

it was a resentment

until the end of her days.

It's kind of something
we can't talk about

but it is certainly

the most loved movie abroad.

But I recognize a lot of
my mother in this story.

There is a lot of her

and also in "Inferno".

My favorite thing to do
was go to the video store

and rent horror films.

And that's when
I saw "Suspiria."

As they say with any drug,
the first time you try it,

the second time, you're hooked.

And that really became
my lifelong obsession

and interest in his
work and what he does.

I think that a lot of
his movies are more,

you know, modern fairy
tales than anything else,

and obviously that
makes them timeless.

Having been introduced to
his work through "Suspiria,"

I think that still
thinking about the film

after all those years,

I guess to me was just
this... the... the overall

just amount of emotions
that would fly over you and,

and just, like, indoctrinate
you emotionally and physically.

And then I also think it's
the ultimate cocaine movie

because it's like at one point
his dealer ran out of cocaine

and he just stopped the movie
because it's such an abstract,

you know, concept.

But that also, I think,

is what makes it such
an interesting film.

I am anxious before
starting a movie.

Why?

I can't get rid of
that so much stress

so from the film, I always
get very strong depression,

I think about suicide, even
if I shouldn't say it, though

tonight I can tell you anything.

I felt like a pull
towards the window,

to almost throw myself out.

I don't know why, everything
was fine the movie was good

I had a lot of fun, I went
out a lot after I got divorced

I was single, I went out,
I had a lot of girlfriends

it was wonderful!

I remember that I lived
in a hotel in via Veneto

while I was making a
film, called "Suspiria"

and

almost every night I was taken from this
desire to throw myself out the window.

I spoke about it with a doctor
friend of mine and he told me

"put a wardrobe in front of the
window. Do you have a wardrobe?"

And in fact I
barricaded this window

with the wardrobe, a
small table and a chair.

The suicidal idea is very quick,

it comes to you

and if you have to
move the wardrobe

to turn, work, open,

it has already passed.

- But why did you want to die?
- I had absolutely no reason to!

I have no idea why this
thought came to me...

Because, in fact, I was happy.

Strange!

And weren't the two daughters a
reason that could bind you to life?

In fact the idea of committing
suicide made me sad for their pain.

But I thought that I was so sad anyway,
that I was not of help for the girls.

♪

FIORE: [Speaking Italian]

For me he is my family,

my world, my everything, it
has always been like this.

My mother traveled
a lot for work

and I've always been with him
he's my point of reference.

He is my dad!

♪

How are you here?

At first I thought
it was terrible

because I didn't like the people who stay
in this hotel but the weather is good,

then I'm always by
myself, always writing,

so basically I meet
people only when I eat,

otherwise I don't see
anyone, for me it's the same

this or another hotel,

eventually it is the same.

[Both chuckle]

My family was very close when
my grandfather was around.

On Sundays we all went
to have lunch together,

the classic bourgeois
family thing to do.

Keeping the family
together, that was him!

In fact, when he became
sick, the family fell apart.

These lunches never
happened again.

I remember my mother hated them,
these bourgeois Sunday lunches,

instead for me they
were fantastic.

I think they were important

to my father, who has a bourgeois spirit.
They are important for his stability.

I mean, he had these emotional
peaks through his work,

to have

such a strong basis

it helped him, held him steady.

[Gunshots, wind whistling]

NARRATOR: I do not know what
price I shall have to pay

for breaking what we
alchemists call silentium.

Even now, I sometimes dream
of working on that film!

NARRATOR: The life
experiences of our colleague

should warn us not
to upset laymen

by imposing our
knowledge upon them.

Everyone who worked on it knew

they were doing
something different.

DEL TORO: To me,
the two masterworks

that for me are addictive
are "Inferno" and "Suspiria."

In "Inferno," you start
realizing that these movies

are part of a larger puzzle,

and you get, again, the sense
that it's not just a house

and a victim and a killer.

The universe is insane,

particularly, you
know, in Argento.

These moments that
come out of nowhere,

the moment that the antiquarian
is drowning the kittens

and now the rats
start eating him,

and then the guy comes from
the little vending post

and kills him, it's shock, but
it feels incredibly surreal,

but incredibly cohesive.

You don't question it.

The universe is malignant.

In fairy tales and in magic,

there is a thing called
the power to declare,

which means you state
something and it becomes

because you declare it.

In fairy tales, it
works like this.

Once upon a time,
there was a princess

that lived at the top
of a glass mountain.

That's it.

You don't have to explain why
the mountain was made of glass.

You don't have to explain
why the princess chose

to live on top of
a glass mountain.

It just is. And
Argento does that.

There is this
underwater room. Sure.

There is a puppet that comes
out from behind the wall.

Sure. There's a
room full of wire.

And they're gonna get
tangled in the wire.

Sure. He just states
these insane possibilities

in the universe with such
faith that they exist.

♪

For example, when Dario made
Inferno with an American production,

he was shooting with a studio that
wanted to teach him how life works

as they're used to explaining to directors
how to make a movie more profitable.

Dario thought “We're
using American money,

"we have plenty of it, so we
can do even crazier things!"

"We're going to make movies
as crazy as Fellini's"

"delirious, oneiric ones,
which were a success".

In order to make "Satyricon",
Fellini used American money too

and Americans gave him a
lot of artistic freedom

so that he could be as extreme
in his movie as he wished to

Dario thought he
had enough money

even to outperform the
craziness of his own films.

Then they told him.

“That's not what we want
narratively speaking, etc.”.

For someone who
had begun filming

through the production
of his father.

Who would always defend

and recommend him to
investors and distributors.

He could not fathom
what they meant

and how money could
rewrite his work.

Inferno is written
as if it was a dream,

kind of like “Age of Gold" or
"An Andalusian Dog" by Buñel.

The movie might be
harder to understand.

♪

It is the film that has
taken most of my time

because I wrote part
of it in New York

in winter, while it was snowing

and I stayed in the
hotel and wrote.

I wrote, I wasn't satisfied.

The months went by, it was too
difficult, it was an alchemic film,

it was an enigmatic film.

The president of
20th Century Fox,

she watched it
sitting next to me.

At the end she told me.

"Look... I didn't
understand some things

and I think the audience
won't understand”.

It was released in theaters
in the rest of the world,

but not in America

because the American audience is
not used to this kind of cinema,

so enigmatic and so full
of unsolved mysteries.

I let the audience
watch the scene

and try to understand why,
what did that sentence mean.

In some countries
such as England

it was also a great
success from the audience,

so these riddles actually
interested the audience.

[Screams]

Do you want to scare me?!

We are live with "Blitz", a
lighting bolt ripping the darkness.

Let's hear what
the music is like.

Slowly, slowly.

Grow, grow, grow.

♪

REFN: "Tenebrae," which
is your, in a way,

traditional, you know,

"Who's the killer?" kind of
Agatha Christie storyline,

but yet in his hands,

it becomes more like a
surreal fashion show.

"Tenebrae" brought Argento
back to the beginning

he went back to making a
Giallo with a classic story

of the assassin who kills
everyone with his black glove.

And he wanted the Goblins
again for this occasion,

but it was not possible because
we had split up in 1978.

After the Goblins, I
completely changed genre.

I started making dance music.

I thought that "Tenebrae"
should have more modern music

and less 70s rock.

Besides the, you know,
use of electronic music,

which, you know, I have to say

I stole a lot from
later on in my life,

um, you know his intro to
that kind of disco beat.

Completely electronic
work was done

in fact there is not even a drummer,
there is the electronic battery

a kind of electronic rock.

It's like "Tenebrae" was
the first disco horror

in a true sense of the arts

when it comes to
aesthetics and design.

Again, you know, what
I find about Dario

more than anyone else is just
he's incredibly inventive

and he's incredibly exciting
about being an inventor.

And it's inspiring, you know?

I mean, is he the greatest
filmmaker of all time?

I don't know. I mean, I
don't know what... who is,

you know, but he's the best
version of Dario Argento.

When I was assistant on “Tenebrae”
and I met Dario's family

I used to see in the cinema.

"Salvatore Argento presents"

"a film by Dario Argento"

"produced by Claudio Argento"

"written and directed
by Dario Argento."

You entered a universe where you say
"Are these all from the same family?"

As I said before, Argento,
Argento means silver

and silver is a tinkling
thing, a precious thing...

No, instead

let's butcher people!

♪

The Louma was a device
that no one had ever used.

This Louma started from a point
and circled the whole house

and it entered the window
from the other side.

I remember when it
was told to the troupe

of “The Passenger” by Antonioni,

that the camera would go
out the window in the ending

there was this idea
of doing things

that would remain in history, as it
has remained in the history of cinema.

♪

Dario was immediately

very welcoming and affectionate
with me truly like an older brother,

both he and Lamberto protected
me because I was very young.

There are a lot of
strange people in this job

and they were afraid that
I might take a bad turn

because there were those
who drank after midnight

and he told me "Be
careful, don't drink."

If they offer you
a drink, say no!”

I told him "But I don't
drink, what should I care".

Both of your two daughters have
decided to come and live with you

when they were very young.

What was family life like
with two girls to raise?

Like the ones of all
fathers actually.

And therefore I also had
a double responsibility,

and so this pushed me to be
more involved in the family.

For me it was a
beautiful experience.

Fiore, will your dad get angry on the
set, but does he get angry also at home?

Has it ever happened with you?

Sure, yes!

It happens to argue - Of course!

They can't be left as

a wild horse that

♪ BANG ♪

you pat its ass and say "Go!"

And it goes.

No, that's not how

you raise a child.

There's absolute equality
with both daughters

and I have to say, it's
a thing I don't see often

which I don't see much
in other families.

So he does one thing for one he
also does one thing for the other

there has always been.

And it must be difficult
too always having to balance

a smile to one, then a smile to
the other, a good word, a good word

a help, a help, a trip, a trip.

Never do a little less for one
or a little less for the other.

How come?

Yes, yes, it's something that
comes instinctive though,

that you know you have to
do this, and so you will!

[Both chuckle]

[Woman screaming]

[Thud, woman groaning]

[Glass breaking]

You chose both your
daughters in movies.

The first was Fiore in
"Creepers", making her debut

and you immediately murdered
her. Why did he make that choice?

Did it have a meaning
or was it just for fun?

No, no, it's not fun.

Making movies is
serious business!

Serious and demanding

no, it's never been a joke,
entertainment is different.

No, I wrote this film
having my daughter near me

who was 13 years old,

and I saw her and said "I
think she could do it right"

I thought "But she's
not an actress.

Oh well, but nobody is
really an actress at 13"

I love you. I love you all.

♪

During a dinner, it was a party.

Where there were
various movie people.

Someone thought to play a game.

That is "Who would you
like to be in cinema?"

And I said "I would like
to be Daria Nicolodi".

"Wait, why?"

"Because she writes films
with Dario Argento".

And since I was a big
fan of Dario Argento,

who I didn't meet yet,
I expressed this wish.

And in fact then I
became after not long.

Daria Nicolodi.

"Creepers" is the first
film we wrote together

and for him it was a turning point
because it was the first film that

he produced or attempted
to produce by himself.

So he told me "I can't go wrong"

and in fact we had taken a long
time to write this screenplay

and at first he
gave me some input.

One was.

"In my films there is
always the family."

And there is family in
"Creepers", an absent family

but there is one!

The main character, she is looking for
her father, she is looking for a mother.

Usually the directors like
staying in the shade for a while.

Meaning that only
the actors are shown.

Instead Dario was a
character who everybody knew

also because he is
very particular.

And I have to say that
when we were hanging out

I was also a bit his "bodyguard"

because everyone went to him to ask
for autographs, to bust his balls.

I think it's hard.

And I must say he has always
given himself to everyone!

You told that years ago there was a
more homemade variant, a famous double

a doppelgänger of Dario Argento,
who pretended to be you.

He went around Rome claiming
to be Dario Argento,

what did he do?

He went to restaurants to eat and
he said that he was Dario Argento

and that he didn't have any change,
but it would pass after a few days.

He had nothing to do with me,
because he was a guy with long hair

with a prophet's long beard.

They reported him, they
took him to the police.

And he started looking for me,

I had to do a press conference
where I should have said

that he was not Dario Argento.

"You have to do it
by force, by force

otherwise, when I meet
you, I'll slaughter you!"

There were a lot of mythomaniacs
stalking him, not just that guy.

We just told that guy over there
"Listen, what do you want?"

Now we are working, you
have to leave us alone,

otherwise we call the police.

Then there was Cozzi
who was quite energetic.

They started to fight,

and this was a lesson, I think a good one
for him, because he never showed up again.

He.

Lion in cinema, sheep in
life! I mean he was scared.

And now I don't remember the
names of the women who stalked him

who became obsessed with him.

♪

[Shouting in Italian]

♪

MARSILLACH: [Speaking Spanish]

Dario called me and told
me he wanted to see me.

I said yes and he said "Well, come
on, let's go for a short trip."

I'll pick you up at your house,
then I drop you off at your house.

In the meantime, I'll
tell you about the movie".

♪

♪

♪

[Crows cawing]

[Cawing stops]

♪

So, he came to pick me up at my
house and we left with the car.

It was a very long ride for me.

He told me the idea he had,
how he wanted to realize it.

He insisted that I was
the perfect character

that Betty was a very pure girl.

It was a word he used a lot.

The atmosphere on the set was
one of of great professionalism,

everyone was focused on their plot
and a lot of respect for Dario

everyone.

He usually speaks very softly,
which I thought was exquisite.

It was a lot of fun
because he is very nervous

and then, well, he was
talking to me, in five minutes

he would transfer the
magic, the electricity to me

and then he would
go to the cameraman

and say "This is how it's done".

Then to the one with the light, he was
at the one with the light and makeup,

he was like a lizard
moving all over the place.

But it was him, all the rest
of us revolved around him.

It's coming at you, no no!

One here!

Look here Cristina,
you look at him here!

Yes, come forward, come forward.

Ok, you say "no, no, I said
no!" ZAM! He got stabbed.

And he fell on your feet, he
is here next to your feet.

Every morning they put the adhesive
plastes on me with the pins.

Dario always came when
I had scenes like that

he would always come to my side, and
he would always say to me like this

they're not going to
take off, are they?

He would check.

"No, no, you've got it
well glued, very good."

It was very uncomfortable a lot of times,
because I couldn't move my eyes very well.

For him, it was all natural

and he made us feel natural about
everything that was going on.

♪

GORI: [Speaking Italian]

Dario makes a very
particular kind of film

which also does not follow the
Italian tradition of cinema.

Dario Argento movies
were famous abroad

where the culture of
these kind of films

was at its peak and
moreover also in America.

And a friendship was
born between me and Dario

I think before even
making the film.

And then I remember we made a good
film, one of the best we have ever made

and then it went well
all over the world.

You stomp on him, do you
understand?! Like this.

Yes, hard! You're a
fury, understood?!

There was also tension
between him and Marsillach

because she must be wet

and he wanted something to be
seen through the white blouse.

She didn't want to take off
her bra, then Dario sent me

to say "Cristina could you
please remove your bra?"

And she said first yes, then
no, then she lifted it a bit.

Then when I went back to
Dario, he asked me "So?!"

“No, she says no”.

And he, in fact, was so angry
that he stopped talking to her.

The feeling I get from Dario
Argento as a director of actors

for me

it's wonderful, because
he helped me a lot.

I don't know if he did it intentionally
or not, but he helped me a lot.

That coldness, that detachment,
even contempt for me

that he didn't talk to
me, or gave me directions

in a very cold way, right?

Very "Put yourself there, I don't know
what, and now you have to do this".

Ready now? All set?
Fantastic. Come on, everybody.

And maybe like a father
to a daughter, right?

Like "let's go help this girl".

To really feel everything
that is going on in the film

and I did not feel hurt

that is, I did not perceive that I was
the victim and he was the executioner

and I believe that we
were on an equal footing,

because I was helping him
and he was helping me.

The last memory I have

of Dario Argento on set was.

I think we gave
each other a hug.

♪

I am two Dario Argentos,

There is the normal
Dario Argento in life,

then there is another Dario
Argento, the one who instead

has a deep dialogue with himself, the
dialogue with the dark side of him,

who lives these experiences between
the dreamlike and the unreal

and then transmits them to the
spectators. So we are two people.

♪

PRODUCER: [Speaking Spanish]

If you have to describe
him, who is Dario Argento?

Who is Dario Argento?

I don't know.

I do not know who
Dario Argento is

I'm sorry, but I just don't know,
I don't know how to answer this.

♪

Listen, out of curiosity, what
do you have in your pocket?

What?

I mean if I frisked you right now,
what would I find in your pocket?

- Like a policeman?
- Show me.

Matches, 10 Lire,
two cinema tickets.

One "Monsieur Verdoux"

"I watched it recently, I watched
it the day before yesterday.

This here “The Last Tycoon".

A telephone.

A remote control.

A little train.

A penknife, I found it in front.

An elastic band.

A slightly sucked
candy, don't look.

You can hardly see it, a stone.

A glittering

stone.

This is a poem that I translated

by John Donne, a 17th century English
poet which is called "Broken Heart".

But above it I put a
quote of a sentence

said by Monsieur
Verdoux Chaplin.

A very nice quote.

"Despair is the narcotic that generates
indifference among the people".

Think about it for a moment.

For someone like you
seeking isolation

and peace to write in tranquility
away from everyone in hotels

isn't the mobile phone a problem now
that everyone can reach you everywhere?

No, that's not true, because
if I put it on silent mode

no one can reach me.

So...

♪

I once said I believe that
he brought me into the world

to have a protagonist
in his films

after he broke up
with my mother.

Me and my father are very similar,
both mentally and physically.

He, although he almost
always had female leads.

I think he identified
with the main character

and therefore, being myself almost an
extension of my father just because,

we had such a similar childhood,
two very introverted people,

book worms, both
Virgos, very organized.

Then when I became an
actress I connected the dots

I said "Ah here it is, the
perfect protagonist is me".

I mean I'm my father
in those movies!

[Conversing in Italian]

I spent a long time with Asia

as the main character
of my films.

I know that her way of
acting attracted me,

to pose, to narrate,
to tell her expression,

her face, her smile, her eyes.

She always was

my favourite actress!

PRODUCER: [Speaking Italian]

That fury, the one that was
in Argento until "Opera"

has faded a bit and changed,
what do you think happened?

What changed in Dario
at the end of the 80s?

First of all, in "Opera" there's
really been a budget exploit.

Dario also called an Oscar-winning
cinematographer: Ronny Taylor.

Those were the days when
Dario imagined a dolly

attached to the ceiling of
the Parma Regio Theater.

Slowly descending with the
a remote-controlled camera

simulating the subjective
view of a crow.

These are those things that
took three weeks to build,

with testing and everything

and then didn't work very well.

They were times when those
things could still be done.

At some point we started
to film in English

choosing an American
actor or actress,

making these
international products

it has stopped working,
they are no longer done.

Actually this change
after "Opera",

I link it a little to
my grandfather's death.

An event, the death of
grandfather Salvatore,

which I know touched him a lot

and therefore he has changed like
everyone else change, like human beings

and therefore our cinema, our works
are a reflection of who we become.

What happened in my father's
cinema is very natural

and it's a good thing
that he didn't stay still

making the same cinema
over and over again.

A person who always
remains the same,

it means that he hasn't evolved.

My father evolved as a human being,
although he has mellowed over time.

He'd hate to hear that,
but I'm happy for him.

The key is television,
television has funded ever since

all Italian cinema.

But it was no longer
the old Italian cinema

because Italian cinema
was made for television,

done with the TV clauses.

Among the clauses, there is also the one
that says that if your film is R-rated,

you must return all the
money we gave you to make it.

Which changed cinema because
the authors were no longer

free to express their true
imagination as they wanted.

[Indistinct shouting]

Dario always replies "We made that
cinema, then that cinema was transformed".

[Man speaking Italian]

It's nobody's fault,
it's the market's fault.

At a certain point there
was no more request.

[Crowd singing in Italian]

There's something
about their agenda

that is more glamorous than we
sometimes make it out to be,

because what he's been
able to do as a filmmaker

over the years is be
completely himself,

which is the only thing
that you can never take away

from anyone if
you're 100% yourself.

And he's never
compromised on that.

And so for me, all
his work is great,

even maybe films that I
think are better than others,

but it's still... it's
a Dario Argento film.

It's... It's... That
signature is everlasting.

And in a way, I feel that
he's not fully realized

as one of the great visual
artists of our time.

[Breathing heavily]

Couldn't think of anything else.

GORI: [Speaking Italian]

I had the idea for a film.

I have to propose
this to Dario Argento

and it was "Seven".

The one written
by me took shape,

it had been even
more “Americanized”

and then it became
the success it became.

And when I see Dario
I always tell him.

"Look, the credit, you don't
know, but the credit is yours!"

COZZI: [Speaking Italian]

At first he was a revolutionary.

He wanted to stand out from everyone,
do better than everyone else.

Then he got into a system.

Earlier his films were
produced, but not only his

all Italian films were produced to
do better than the previous film.

By putting in more gore, more
crazy scenes, more madness

all this broke with the
arrival of television.

"Trauma" marks a turning point
because there is no more art,

there is no more theatrics

there's the American world.

"Trauma" was a very
difficult film.

I wanted to work with my
father from the beginning

but I started when I was nine
and he called me when I was 16,

after I had already
made several films

as an actress,
with great authors.

And I was like, "But when
is he going to call me?"

And then he did.

I was terribly afraid
of disappointing him.

Plus it was a film in English,

where I had to speak
with a Romanian accent

and there was the
theme of anorexia.

My sister Anna
suffered from anorexia,

so it was a thorny subject.

I had studied many books and in those
days I didn't know a lot about anorexia,

in the early 90s.

It was quite

painful!

Also because

we have never spoke about
this topic with my sister Anna

that we were making
a film about her.

Because what was said at that
time was that anorexia comes

from a girl with
an absent father

and a mother too present, which is kinda
what the plot of the film speaks about.

The character of the mother had to be my
mother and I was supposed to be my sister.

My sister came to
watch the film,

but there was no
speech about it.

"Look, this is to help you" we did a kind
of psychodrama, but only with the film.

It didn't help anyone,
maybe just us at that time.

ANNOUNCER: A new
film by the master

of the psychological
thriller, Dario Argento.

The memory of "The Stendhal
Syndrome" is not so fresh,

but between the movies he made with Asia
is the one that touches me the most.

It's a fabulous film

and I find the film to
be almost more cerebral

than "Inferno", which is
maybe his film or is openly.

"The Stendhal Syndrome" is my
favorite movie we did together.

I felt a great freedom as an
actress in that character.

She was a powerful character,

in fact I remember that
during the shooting filming,

I felt a bit haunted
by this character.

And even when the film was finished,
that character stayed with me.

She wasn't a spirit of
light, she was very dark.

Come forward, come come.

Come forward, come,
see? Never stop.

OK, another one.

Come down and immediately open.

Ready? Where are you looking
now, are you looking down?

No.

No, I look like that.

Look at the other look.

But there were scenes in "The
Stendhal Syndrome" really

really hard to shoot.

At that time I didn't have
the courage to tell my father.

"But why do we have
to do these scenes?"

Because in the end he always says
"Because the movie is like that!"

Oh well, you're my daughter
but you're also the actress,

we have to do these scenes,
that's how I wrote it!”

I can't explain

why

we shoot these extreme scenes.

Sure, it's unusual for
a father and daughter

to make such extreme films, even
from a sexual point of view,

especially such a young
girl in her twenties.

But our relationship

is kinda grown

and precisely by the
fact that we went

into the abyss so deep into
the human psyche together

and then we'd come
out the other side

without a scratch.

She is a sensitive girl, who
tried to become a policewoman

exactly to go against
this strong sensitivity.

Which inevitably comes out in
front of such beautiful paintings

and while travelling she
is lost, she is a tourist.

She feels unwell and her
oversensitivity comes out.

Her identity breaks and each part
of her personality comes out.

She has no control of herself.

The relationship between father
and daughter is fabulous.

It must make a lot
of women jealous

or envious to witness such a creative,
artistic and joyful relationship.

And yes, they are both fascinating beings,
kind of unbridled, never self-censuring.

They have their own limits and
their relationship code but

they make movies in
a joyful atmosphere.

Of course, there are things in
life that can't be joyful, but

they are exactly where they
want to be, and they are proud

to be where they stand,
and they work their magic.

Few fathers and daughters

can brag about having collaborated
together on such ambitious projects.

[Indistinct conversations]

[Camera shutter clicks]

No! No! No! I don't
want to stay here!

With her face and... you see...

And I go "Oooo Mon tresor".

When we shot that sex scene

in "The Phantom of the Opera",

there was a sword of Damocles
hanging on this scene.

We hadn't talked about it when
we were going to shoot it.

That day my grandmother
Fulvia was there

my mother's mother with whom me
and my father were very close,

came to meet us in
Budapest that very day.

And my grandmother sat with her chair
facing away, to not to look at the set.

I was embarrassed and I already
had the angel tattoo on the belly,

they had hidden the
tattoo with make-up

and my father had complained
to the operator saying.

"Oh well the tattoo
is really big".

I then cried even more,
I felt humiliated.

I mean I was losing my
virginity in front of my father.

It was just the Electra
complex to the nth degree.

It's been very tiring.

Just a day to forget.

But then when it was
over, I definitely cried,

my father didn't cry,
but he was relieved.

♪

I should have done "The Card Player",
but I was in the United States,

where the production of my second film
as a director “The Heart is Deceitful”

started very quickly.

So I couldn't go back to Italy,
for me it was a unique opportunity

make my second film as a director
at 27 in the United States.

My father was very upset

and then he didn't talk to
me for a couple of years

for this reason.

For me it was terrible,
but also for him I think.

And I remember that I contacted him,
when I finished shooting the film,

to ask him for advice

but it took a while
for our relationship

to come back to how it
was before the movie.

I would say like before
I became a mother.

MAN: [Speaking Italian]

Argento,

your vocation is to
terrorize people.

Yes

yes, it is a vocation, but also a
personal, cultural predisposition

perhaps It's also a constant,
who knows, of my nightmares

of my dreams, even of
my cultural choices.

But it's complicated.

I would not even say that the
predisposition is just terrifying

because terror is a phase
that beginners provoke.

I'm looking for panic,
which is something more,

it's a deeper penetration.

If we want to compare
panic to terror and fear,

we can say that
fear, for example,

it is a feverish state with
a temperature of 100.5.

Instead panic is 106 degrees
temperature, that is delirium.

Many years ago I
said that fear was

like having a feverish state
with a temperature of 100.5

and panic was even higher fever.

As a joke to explain
what panic is.

Panic is also something
quite inexplicable

that takes you to a
dimension you don't know

that you can't control.

The only time I've ever seen my father cry
was when my grandfather Salvatore died.

It was Easter, we
went to the Vatican

and there was Pope
Wojtyla speaking.

My father was not religious,
not yet at the time

and I don't know why he brought me
and my sister Fiore to see the Pope.

And then, seeing the Pope speak,

my father bursts into tears
with his hands folded like this

he asked for forgiveness "Forgive
me, forgive me" and cried.

And I know that he was speaking
to his father, my grandfather.

This is still a very strong,
very touching image for me today,

seeing my father fragile.

Because he is just a
man from another time,

he has never shown himself
fragile, even today.

He hates to be seen fragile.

NOÉ: [Speaking French]

Since the moment I first
spoke about the story,

before I even started
writing anything.

I've been thinking about how Dario
would be amazing in the father's role.

Maybe because of how
familiar he is to me

and because of his Italian ways, how he
moves his hands while he is speaking,

it reminded me of my own father.

I remembered him during his
presentation of his films to the public,

when he introduced
"Phantom of the Opera",

the guy is on stage and
for an hour straight,

he can't stop talking

and people are clapping as if they
were watching the movie itself.

He's so much more charismatic

than most comedians I know
in France or elsewhere.

I thought "Hey,
he'd be perfect".

Even better than the actor

who played "Umberto
D." in De Sica's movie.

[Speaking Italian]

Do you know why I make cinema?

Why doing it, why? I know
why, I absolutely know.

I do what I do because
I want to be loved!

Okay.

♪

The car arrives at four o'clock.

Okay, let's go.

♪

May I accompany you, Maestro?

Thank you.

There's something very
abnormal about Dario.

He even looks like a creature
in certain ways, you know?

He has all those specifics
that makes you go,

"Is he a ghoul or a zombie or
just a frustrated painter?"

You don't really know.

But that's also the
mystery of Dario Argento.

You know, every filmmaker
wishes that they are

the signature of their work
and embodies everything in it.

Here is somebody that actually
did it, and he did it his way.

And you can never take
that away from him.

You can see a Dario movie
in 20 years from now,

30 years, 100 years from now.

You will go back like you would
look at the great painters

or sculptors or composers of
Italy, literature writers.

You know, he will
be that legacy,

and we should never forget that.

He's someone who makes
you want to live,

someone who makes you
want to have a family.

Someone who makes you
want to make movies

and someone who makes you want
to watch other people's movies.

When I asked him
to be in the movie,

he said “Why are you
proposing this to me?”

"I'm young, can't you
see?", and I replied.

"I do, but, we can lie,
make you look older, etc."

It's true, he's an
eternal teenager

with the cinematographic
intelligence of an adult director.

However, his behavior is that
of an everlasting teenager.

Various directors are
trained on his films,

one of these, for
example, is Tim Burton

who came to Rome and asked
to meet Dario Argento.

What did the two
do? Did they talk?

No!

Because they both knew to be
ordinary people in real life.

Well Tim Burton

is Tim Burton

that is, a badly dressed man with
awful shoes, with a black ugly coat,

with big teeth forward,
a bit long hair.

We know Dario Argento

and instead they know very well that
they transform when they do their job.

Horror film is like a
hostage negotiation.

You come out of
the bank and say,

"I'm gonna shoot a hostage."

The audience
doesn't believe you,

so you shoot the hostage,
and the audience goes,

"Oh, my God. He...
He's serious."

And Argento does that.
Argento crosses the line.

If you know De Palma, Carpenter,
they seems like two normal gentlemen.

No, Dario is Dario
Argento, he has no equal.

Because Dario Argento is fear!

I still remember New York
at the time of "Inferno",

"Alien" just came out.

Dario and I went to see "Alien",

we were so scared that we
had our legs over the seat.

I remember this like
it was yesterday.

He was someone who was happy in
our company, he liked to joke.

He had a sense of humor,

he had a sense of humor!

People can't believe it,
but yes he does have it!

One thing is the movies you make,
one thing is how you are, right?

He has luckily never
felt like a star,

because in this way he
remained a very concrete person

Dario Argento is Dario Argento

he is like Andy Warhol

he paints you a painting,
it's an Andy Warhol painting!

And therefore a great artist!

Many young people know his films,
they discover and love them

but many others only know
that "he's the scary one!"

They talk and say "But who
is this Dario Argento?"

He's the one who did "The
Exorcist", didn't you watch it?

That is, they universalized it.

Dario is now fear himself!

When I won the David di
Donatello, I was 18 years old.

I returned home with this prize

and my father who, in short, he is one of
the greatest Italian directors of all time,

he had never been
nominated, he had never won.

Then he won it later as a
lifetime achievement award.

I went home, we
looked at each other

and he told me "Oh well,
sticazzi!” ("Who cares”)

This thing frees
me a lot because

in fact sticazzi, because
who cares about the prizes!

This was the important lesson.

It's not the rewards, it's the work.
Work is the most important thing.

The real prize is being
able to make a film.

It's like a miracle

to be able to make films,
today more than ever!

My dreams

they've changed, they've

they changed because I changed.

I think that.

I will continue to explore

my depths

my dark half

my dark half that is

in reality

the true

the true reason why I
do cinema in this way.

[Man speaking Italian]

Implacable death exists

and you can't escape,

but I don't think about it.

♪

Yes, you made me talk
for almost two hours!

- Three quarters of an hour.
- No, no, no, it's 11!

Yes, it was 10.
An hour, an hour!

♪

♪