Behind the Couch

2011 Dirs. Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo With Livid , the makers of Inside , one of the most intense and shocking of a recent slew of New Wave Gallic horror films, venture down a more fantastical, though no less traumatic route for their sophomore offering. When Lucy (Chloé Coulloud) begins training as a care worker for the elderly, she visits the imposing and isolated home of an ancient, barely alive former ballet teacher called Madame Jessel. The young woman hears rumours of forbidden treasures hidden within the house, and when she tells her boyfriend and his brother, the three decide to break in, steal the treasure, and leave town to begin anew somewhere else. Needless to say when they enter Madame Jessel’s vast and eerie abode, things don’t go according to plan, and the three find themselves at the mercy of a powerful witch with vampiric tendencies… Maury and Bustillo’s screenplay takes time to introduce and establish the three friends. They’re from a small fishing ...

1989 Dir. Luigi Cozzi AKA Demons 6: De Profundis When a horror film based on the same source material as Dario Argento’s Suspiria and Inferno goes into production, the evil witch the story is based upon manifests herself and not only begins to terrorise the actress set to portray her on screen, but reveals plans to wreck havoc and bloodshed throughout the world. Luigi Cozzi’s The Black Cat was conceived and written by Daria Nicolodi as an unofficial finale to Dario Argento's then still unfinished Three Mothers Trilogy, which began with Suspiria and Inferno , and was eventually completed in 2007 with Mother of Tears . The Three Mothers’ films chart the exploits of three ancient witches, Mater Suspiriorum (the Mother of Sighs), Mater Tenebrarum (the Mother of Darkness) and Mater Lachrymarum (the Mother of Tears) determined to inflict untold suffering upon the world. The Black Cat focuses on the third mother, Mater Lachrymarum – Levana - as she attempts to retur...

1980 Dir. Dario Argento When poet Rose (Irene Miracle) discovers an old book written by a mysterious architect, she believes that the New York building in which she resides is also home to one of the Three Mothers – powerful witches who bring suffering and death to all who encounter them. She asks her brother Mark (Leigh McCloskey) to come and help her, however prior to his arrival she is stalked through the building’s labyrinthine interior and slain by an unseen, and presumably supernatural assailant. It is up to Mark to follow the cryptic clues left by his sister and solve the mystery of The Mother of Darkness, before it is too late… Preceded by Suspiria (1977), Inferno is the second instalment of Argento’s only recently completed Three Mother’s trilogy - Mother of Tears (2007) is the final film. In Suspiria , we are introduced to the notion that three powerful witches, residing in different parts of the world, ensure that hopelessness, sorrow and death hang heavy upon those...

1977 Dir. Dario Argento The arrival of American ballerina, Suzy Banyon (Jessica Harper), at a prestigious dance academy in Freiburg, coincides with a series of savagely brutal murders. Suzy slowly begins to realise that the academy is actually a front for a coven of witches led by the diabolical Mater Suspiriorum – The Mother of Sighs – who plans to unleash untold suffering and pain upon the world. With her friends falling prey to evil supernatural powers and no one to believe her seemingly outrageous story, Suzy must face her deadly foe alone… The first film in a trilogy, Suspiria precedes Inferno (1980) and the only recently completed final chapter, Mother of Tears (2007). With Suspiria , Dario Argento and his co-writer Daria Nicolodi created one of the most vivid, nightmarish and hallucinogenic horror films of all time. Deeply influenced by the drug-induced and vivid writing of Thomas De Quincey, Argento also borrows from Lewis Carroll, the Brothers Grimm and Snow White a...

2007 Dir. Dario Argento After 27 years Argento finally returned to the sinister figures of the Three Mothers to complete his trilogy that began with Suspiria (1977) and Inferno (1980). While wildly different in tone and style from the previous two instalments, Mother of Tears contains some of Argento’s cruellest, most sadistic imagery yet. And that’s saying something. The film follows the outrageous journey of art restoration student Sarah Mandy (Asia Argento) who, after witnessing the brutal murder of her colleague by three mysterious figures, soon realises that a powerful witch known as the Mother of Tears has returned to Rome and intends to unleash evil and untold heartache throughout the world. Argento teamed up with writers Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch to pen the shocking and psychedelic Mother of Tears . Anderson and Gierasch also wrote Crocodile , The Toolbox Murders and Mortuary for Tobe Hooper . Argento insisted that Mother of Tears be as different from Susp...