While there is a lot to enjoy in Tenebre, including Argento’s direction, the score and brutal murders, ultimately this murder-mystery is sunk by an awful script, bad dubbing and a harsh, garish look that hasn’t aged well at all. For those who aren’t Argento fans, it will be hard to stay engaged as the murders occur, since there is little to no tension and the mystery is paper-thin. Also, without one redeeming or sympathetic character, it’s hard to care, much less swallow the outrageous implausibilities of the story.
You’ll find yourself wishing Argento had hired a good screenwriter to tell this convoluted tale. Instead it just drags on, with endless talking-heads and foul red-herring.

Argento is one of horror’s great enigmas. How does a director with so much talent, attention to detail, and class, make movies with so many shocking scenes in them? Listening to him talk for 10 seconds proves he’s well-read, intelligent, and a true artist. Yet, he’s mostly known as a “schlock meister” among idiots who just discovered horror yesterday, or by many others as a “gore and boobs” guy. Nothing could be further from the truth. His usage of nudity is almost always subdued and artistic and his usage of violence has never seemed over the top to me. Although, that reputation would seem to come single-handedly from two films. OPERA and TENEBRE. TENEBRE features the most nudity Argento’s ever directed. Which definitely makes the movie sleazy. Although, no more so than Argento having John Saxon call feminists “dykes,” a detective insult his female assistant for not running fast or being tough (exact words), and a man slapping a woman in an orgy situation… for expecting the men to share her. The film seems unnecessarily sleazy, or to exist for little other reason than to be crude and sexually blunt. To have no point other than to portray men as lying jerks and women as cheating whores. Not nearly as interesting as Argento’s other films, though every bit as stylish and visually breath-taking. Especially stand-out are a fantasy scene at a beach, a woman in a towel’s murder as she crashes through a plate of glass on a staircase (Argento loves murder victims to smash through glass), the famous screaming witness image at the end (Argento’s ex-wife, Daria Nicolodi), and the even more famous blood-gushing ax murder that paints the walls red. Truly this is a film with a lot of sights to show us. Argento doesn’t always do his stories right, but he’s the ultimate cinematic tour-guide. Something amazing in almost every film (and he’s made many).