SUSPIRIA Day 14: shades of evil

I love the blink–and-you'll-miss-it picture of Helena Markos we see early on in the movie. Susie has just arrived for her audition and pauses to take in the Tanzgruppe photos on display. There's one of the dancers and another of the matrons that is almost in accordance with the way each woman voted. (Vendegast and Marks are on the wrong sides however.)

There she is, a true Frau in her suit and dictator chic sunglasses. There, her opposite, is the undeniably charismatic and cool Madame Blanc. But Helena is the "light they choose to follow," as Tanner puts it, the one without whom the Company will fall apart. Or so she has led them to believe.

I'm fascinated by this Markos. The Hutt-adjacent version we see at the Sabbath is a disease-and-baby-arms-riddled monstrosity whose life has been extended unnaturally with the life essences and sacrifices of the young. I'm so curious about the Markos that's in this photo, the one who is hundreds of years old but still, you know, wears clothes.

I will get into "Blanc vs Markos" in a later post, but these photos really sum it up, don't they? Artist vs Dictator. The different ways of wielding power, and the costs.

I'm not usually a fan of horror movie prequels' and sequels' propensities for attempting explanations and solving mysteries that didn't warrant solving. For example, I don't want or need the life story and backgorund for Halloween's Michael Myers, Texas Chain Saw's Leatherface, or Black Christmas's Billy. Just let 'em be evil! But oh, how I would greedily lap up more about the Tanzgruppe and everyone in it throughout history and into the future. Once again I mourn the fact that all we'll likely ever have is this one film, because there is so much more, as Guadagnino hinted at in an interview last year:

I have this image in my mind of Helena Markos in solitude in the year 1212 in Scotland or in Spain. Wandering through a village and trying to find a way on how she can manipulate the women of the village. I have this image. I know she was there, I know it was six to seven hundred years before the actual storyline of this film.

I mean. I would step over any one of you to see that! But that's not enough! Where was Markos hanging out before she was put "in a storage cabinet under the floor"? Where does she shop for her BusinessFrau suits? How many pairs of sunglasses does she have? We need answers!