Mother of Tears

Aroview: This missing piece in Argento’s ‘Three Mothers’ trilogy turns to an unassuming art student (daughter Asia, getting her kit off as usual), who, after breaking the seal on an ancient urn, must defeat the malevolent witch she has unwittingly released from inside.

Preceded by SUSPIRIA and INFERNO, the horror maestro’s well-overdue third installment is very much latter-day Argento and predictably, not a return-to-form. Nevertheless, hysterical violence and an abundance of batty ideas – lesbian witches and a cabal of evil supermodels, to name a few – make up for director’s waning visual flair and Grand Guignol pretense.