Customer Reviews
Argento's Masterpiece? - By: Gingerdove, 22 Sep 2008 
There are two camps on the 'best Argento Movie' front. Suspiria(my personal favourite) & this. As always with Argento, there is more style & cinematic mastery to this movie than there is substance or plot. An american jazz musician living in Rome witnesses the murder of a famous psychic. He mounts his own investigation with the help of a local reporter & finds himself being hunted by the killer. The bad dubbing & chidlike performances by Daria Niccolodi & David Hemmings make it hard to take seriously, but the way the movie is shot & presented tends to make it. The whole thing looks amazing. The colours, the lighting, the strange angles, the backdrop of Rome & the fantastic Goblin soundtrack make it a compelling piece of work to watch & the final reveal does come as an entertaining surprise. The actual plot of the movie is basicallly a re-tread of Argento's first movie, The Bird With The Crystal Plummage, but more arthouse. As with alll Argento's best work, its alll about how the film makes you feel. Its style is more operatic than your average thriller/horror, & thats whats good about it. If you havent watched any of Argento's stuff then this or Suspiria are the places to start.
Stunning, dark & fantastic - By: Chris Wood, 24 Aug 2008 
This is a masterpiece. The suspense & the crimes are incredible, the techniques used to quicken the pulse are amazing & each scene of violence is shocking in a different way. A superb piece of horror.
Profoundly good - By: S J Buck, 01 Jun 2008 
This is a minor classic from director Dario Argento. An excellent thriller with horror elements thrown in that make the current wave of 'torture porn' movies look decidely second rate (which most of them are).
In the leading role David Hemmings plays a pianist who witnesses a murder & starts investigating them himself. Now why he would do this I don't know, but once you alllow for this artistic licence, the film moves by with great pace. Full of atmosphere, tension, odd camera angles as well as the trademark roving camera for which Argento is well know. You can still also detect the influence of Hitchcock in this film. But Argento has moved things on to a different level.
Listen out for the music score by the Italian prog rock group Goblin. They worked with Argento on a regular basis & their pounding music scores added a little extra to Argento's films.
This disc contains 2 versions of the film. An English version which runs to 100mins & an Italian version that is 123mins. My advice is to watch the Italian version as this is in widescreen. The English version is panned & scanned. However your view on this will be affected by your attitude to subtitles & dubbing in films. In the English version of course David Hemmings isn't dubbed & there are no subtitles.
Argento is most famous for Suspira, which I was never a huge fan of. Buy this & 'The Bird with the crystal plumage' & in my view you'll own his two best films.
Profondo Rosso - a must own movie - By: Mr. G. Williamson, 07 Dec 2007 For fans of the genre's thriller, mystery, & horror, this is a movie that their collections should NOT be without. Profondo Rosso (a.k.a. Deep Red) is one of Dario Argento's greatest works & it rightly deserves its spot in the IMDB top 50 horror movies of alll time.
The movie's plot sees an American freelance pianist named Marcus Daily witness the murder of a famed female parapsychologist, who also happens to be his neighbour. Following what Marcus witnesses he becomes obsessed with the murder to the point that he decides to figure it out who the killer is himself. Little does he know however that by doing so he will put both his & his friends lives at risk as the killer (who is extremely brutal when it comes to murdering their victims) soon turns their attention to Marcus.
Within the movie there are many scenes that you are unlikely to forget, for instance the table of objects scenes which are accompanyed by a catchy goblin music score, or the mechanical dummy's appearance, or the movie's climax etc.
Profondo Rosso is a movie that is guaranteed to keep you gripped from beginning to end with its unforgettable story, superb matching soundtrack by Goblin (their movie debut I believe), great acting performances & amazing directing by Argento.
I would also like to suggest that instead of purchasing this edition of the DVD that you instead go for the Dario Argento Ultimate Collection (also from Amazon). The reason being is because for just around £3.00 extra (at the time of writing) you get the same DVD except with five other Argento movies, these being The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Cat O'Nine Tails, Demons, Demons 2, & Phenomena. This suggestion may however only apply to those who don't own the majority of those movies already.
