(Mother of Tears/The Third Mother, Italy/USA - 2007)
by Dan McGowan 2/7/09
Cast:
Asia Argento, Cristian Solimeno, Adam James, Moran Atias, Daria Nicolodi, Udo Kier
Genre:
Fantasy/Horror/Thriller
Director:
Dario Argento
Screenplay:
Jace Anderson, Dario Argento, Walter Fasano, Adam Gierasch, Simona Simonetti
Cinematography:
Frederic Fasano
Composer:
Claudio Simonetti
It pains me to say it, but Dario Argento might have lost it for good. His feature film output since The Stendahl Syndrome (1996) has been forgettable at best. His television work on Showtime's Masters of Horror hinted at a possible return to form, and with the closing chapter of his Three Mothers trilogy following this promise up, I was hoping he would reclaim what made him such an interesting filmmaker in the first place. Mother of Tears confirms this is not to be.
Argento's daughter, Asia Argento, stars as Sarah Mandy who is thrust into the middle of the resurrection of the third and final witch in the long awaited conclusion to the Three
Mothers trilogy. A centuries old urn is unearthed that contains powerful talismans and relics which bring back the malevolent Mother of Tears's powers, who uses them to cause
violent chaos in Rome and begin her reign as witch queen. It is too bad that a similar urn from the 70's or 80's was not unearthed alongside it with some relics from Suspiria
or Opera, to reinvigorate Dario's former powers. It pains me to say that about a favorite of mine.
Asia is good enough in the role as Sarah, but Dario Argento movies are less about the
script and acting than the visuals and sound. At least they used to be. Too much is
shoehorned into this plot, with a terrible white witch / guardian parental ghost angle
bogging down the film that really does not benefit the movie in anyway. After setting up
and spending a lot of time establishing Sarah as having some supernatural talents, you'd
expect the climactic battle with the Mother of Tears (Moran Atias) to incorporate Sarah's
emerging talents in shape or form. Without spoiling the ending, I'll just say that there
was really not much of a point to Sarah's supernatural backstory if that was all it took
to dispose of the powerful Mother of Tears. Suspiria was all the better for having a
weak heroine against one of the three mothers, which made it more tense and suspenseful.
This film felt like a pale imitation of the masterful horror works Argento became famous
for. It is easily one of his goriest, bloodiest films to date, but the gore is the center and focus of the various set-pieces now instead of the elaborate visual setups that honed a keen sense of dread he brought forth in films like Suspiria, Profondo Rosso, or Tenebre. That may satisfy some fans of Argento's work who might have latched on solely for the gory bits of his films, but not me. Sure, there was always gore aplenty in those pictures. However, the blood was merely the ugly payoff and visual counterpoint to the beauty and artful discomfort of his preceeding camerawork. There is possibly one Argento flourish I can even think of in Mother of Tears, a very long take following daughter Asia Argento down and backup a winding staircase into the depths of the witches house. The effect, however, is that it reminds you what he was capable of and it is very quickly forgotten as it only leads to a jump out at you, false scare moment. It only serves to make you long for the genius that brought us the Tenebre crane shot or the piazza / dog sequence from Suspiria.
It's sad that the director whose influence brought us classic shots on these shores such
as the wonderful DePalma crane shots in Scarface, for example, just can't get it going
anymore. Too often, Mother of Tears feels like a Lucio Fulci film instead of an Argento.
The gore is the focus, and the operatic camera movements are out the window. It's
almost as if Argento consciously tried to hide his script under buckets of blood. There
are a couple of scenes that are a bit too over the top even for this long time Italian
horror fan. The gore here, and disturbing lack of wit is too far on the Fulci New York
Ripper side of the ledger for me. Very disappointing from such a gifted filmmaker.
