The story is simple, the story falls apart, the story is secondary to the sumptuous filmmaking. This is one of the great visual knockouts of the horror genre. Dario Argento designs every scene here like a great pastry chef crafts fancy black cherry cupcakes. Each one must be beautiful. Every decorative flourish must add to the flavor. This is about an American ballerina 
(Jessica Harper) who attends a German dance academy that’s run by murderous witches, but it’s also about color, light and music. The dialogue here is often less important than the color schemes, which tend to tell you everything you need to know. Something about Argento and cinematographer Luciano Tovoli’s blue lights look like death. Then there are the eye-popping reds and greens, which suggest degrees of fear. Sometimes one color dominates a scene so much, through light and backdrops, that the effect is reminiscent of silent movie tinting. Meanwhile, Goblin’s outrageous music score storms across the screen with eerie music box melodies, demon whispers and tribal drumbeats. It’s a singular achievement in horror movies, so uniquely sensual that you can’t imagine a sequel, let alone a useless remake. See it in a theater, if you ever get the chance, to be really wowed.