SUSPIRIA

Cert Running time

This leaden-footed ballet-based supernatural horror is not only a drab remake of the lavishly-coloured classic original of 1977, but it’s also an unforgivably indulgent one hour longer.

Fifty Shades star Dakota Johnson is impressively physical as Susie, who flees her restrictive Christian community in Ohio to join an austere dance academy in 1977’s Berlin, schooled by Brit actress Tilda Swinton.

Meanwhile, an ageing psychiatrist is searching for Chloe Grace Moretz’s disturbed missing dancer, who believed the ensemble was a witches’ coven.

Earlier this year, director Luca Guadagnino won a best adapted screenplay Oscar for Call Me By Your Name, but he won’t win any awards for this.

Self-importantly divided into seven chapters, the story links witchcraft and religion to corrupt and destructive political ideologies, but fails to develop or clarify its ideas.

A trio of striking dance sequences aside, Suspiria is a muddled and murky mess which will curdle your attention far more than it will your blood.