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"The Black Cat," is Argento's section of a film originally intended to be directed by four of today's masters of the horror genre, Argento, Romero, Carpenter and Craven. Unfortunately, only Romero could join the production. However, Argento's segment has more visual shocks in its first minute than Romero's entire segment. In fact I'm not going to waste any time on that part of the film at all as it is rubbish. OK, that may be overstating it but it doesn't seem as though Romero's heart was in it when he made it.
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| It stays surprisingly close to Poe's tale of an alcoholic artist descending into madness. Rod Usher (Harvey Keitel) is a photographer obsessed with capturing scenes of violence for a book that he is compiling. He shows up at murder sites snapping away at the goriest scenes imaginable. You get the feeling he has an unhealthy fascination almost straight away when he turns up at a murder scene where a womans body has been completely cut in half by a pendulum blade. He lives with a violinist (Madeleine Potter) who brings home a stray black cat. Things go from bad to worse. He gradually starts to lose control of himself and his growing paranoia. It is no surprise when he blames the cat for all of his problems and ends up torturing and killing it whilst photographing it. When his wife discovers this he then kills her as well. |
This is sometimes not an easy film to watch. Although all the cast are good and the effects by Tom Savini are outstanding (it's a shame you can't say the same about his next collaboration with Argento - Trauma). The basic premise, someone who comes to like torturing and killing, is a difficult thing to portray. It is to the credit of Argento and Harvey Keitel that they make this seem so plausible. When Usher finally meets his end trying to evade the police, it's a lovely irony that he dies in the same manner as that in which he killed the cat.
Not a great Argento film but compared to Romero's segment, it's a masterpiece. |  |
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reviewed by NJD |
| credits |
| cast |
Harvey Keitel, Madeleine Potter, John Amos, Sally Kirkland, Kim Hunter, Holter Graham, Martin Balsam |
| director: |
Dario Argento |
| producer: |
Dario Argento, Achile Manzotti |
| screenplay: |
Dario Argento, Franco Ferrini, Edgar Allan Poe (story) |
| cinematography: |
Peter Reniers |
| music: |
Pino Donnagio |
| sfx: |
Tom Savini |
| technical information |
| negative: |
35mm |
| print: |
35mm |
| aspect ratio: |
1.85:1 |
| format: |
Technovision |
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