I've not seen a film by the Italian horror icon Dario Argento before, so where better to start than with his directorial debut the masterfully clever and superbly chilling giallo The Bird with the Crystal Plumage.

From the moment it begins Argento’s gripping narrative carries all the suspense of a Hitchcock feature, but the Italian director’s style is more original than referential. He seamlessly combines familiar horror techniques with his own unique blend of filmmaking – that includes sporadic jump…

I'm a bit weird. I've seen three Argento films before this one (Suspiria, Tenabrae and Deep Red) and liked all of them. And yet it's taken me years to get around to watching another one. I suspect about 6 years, maybe more, since I rented Deep Red. I went through a phase of watching giallo movies and my favourite of those is Tenabrae. You'd think this would have driven me into watching more Argento movies. I can't really explain it.…

Kicking off a Dario Argento run with his debut and a fine one it is at that!

It's creepy, suspenseful and hugely influential for it's time but above all, it's well shot. Many neat sequences and reveals make this a fantastic debut effort. Couple that with the beginnings of a man who has since combined haunting scores with great film making time after time and the stage is set for a classic!

Oh, and if that's not enough, a fairly…

A young American tourist walks aimlessly through the darkened streets of Rome at night, and then without warning he notices a girl being assaulted in a shop across the street. Running to her aid, he becomes trapped between two glass walls, helplessly looking on at the terror unfolding.

That's the set up for The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Dario Argento's impressive directorial debut. Argento cleverly draws on previous films in this sequence, putting the protagonist in the role of…

Even though this was Dario Argento's debut feature it is remarkably well made; extremely confident, bursting with cinematic flair and bags of atmosphere in what was to become his trademark style, for good and for bad. Like the later "Deep Red" and "Suspiria" he is scores highly on the visuals and atmosphere - several scenes are beautifully shot and cleverly conceived - for example the opening attack inside a white art gallery, the protagonist trapped between two huge glass walls…

Film 80 of "The December Project" 2012
98 minutes

I heard about this a while back from the Where the Long Tail Ends podcast, and it was spoken of highly so I had the DVD sent from Netflix.

This movie was great, a very solid murder mystery film. I don't know if you can consider it a Giallo, but I will just because Dario Argento made it. Right from the get go the film didn't stop entertaining me, something I…