What is Luca Guadagnino's new interpretation of "Suspiria"? *Note! Contains spoilers.

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2019.02.12Onodera lineage

A richer setting and story

Susie Banyon (Dakota Johnson), an American girl aspiring to be a dancer, knocks on the door of the famous German contemporary dance company "Marcos Dance Company". Madame Blanc (Tilda Swinton), a charismatic choreographer whom Susie admires, is enrolled there. Susie performs outstandingly in the entrance test and is welcomed into the Marcos Company, where she begins her new life in the dormitory. After that, various strange things start happening around Susie...

On the surface, the setting up to this point doesn't seem to be much different from the original, except that the ballet has been changed to a contemporary one and a description of Susie's origin has been added. However, it becomes clear later on that these changes have an important meaning connected to the main theme.

What's interesting is that the mysterious "snoring" that echoes through the dormitory, which was placed as a mystery in the original version, is replaced in this version by the breathing of her mother, who hates her, and reverberates ominously when the scene of Susie arriving in the country from the United States is shown. This probably seems to indicate that even though she is far away, at the core of her being, she is connected to her mother, whether she wants to or not. This "contract" that she was born with is expressed here as an ominous curse.

Susie is a rising star in the dance company and becomes Madame Blanc's favorite. But something is wrong. When Blanc teaches Susie and has her dance a choreography, a horrible and tragic event occurs in another room. The victim is a woman who is trying to escape from the dance company. Yes, Blanc's choreography was tainted with a curse. And the Marcos Dance Company itself is made up of a group of witches, including Blanc. At the same time, the company's management is in the midst of a regular election for the president. Madame Blanc gets close in the number of votes, but the election ends with the victory of Elena Marcos, a woman who has not yet appeared in the film.

At this point, we can see that this film has been significantly expanded compared to the original setting. In the original, the story was about Susie Bunyon (Jessica Harper), a girl from America, unraveling the plot of a horrible witch who has taken root in Germany. While the girls in the dormitory are being victimized by the witches one after another, the film does not explain why she has the power to resist the witches. If we try to find a reason for this, it may be because she is an "outsider" who has escaped from the regional curses and a kind of sentimentality of Europe. In any case, the witch group in this film is portrayed only as evil exploiters.

Connection between witches and hijackings

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