Is Suspiria Scary? The Verdict and the Whole Plot

Arrive late and meet the worst intercom in Germany

Suzy Bannion is an American ballet student who arrives in Freiburg to enroll at the Tanz Akademie. As she gets there, she sees another student, Pat Hingle, running out of the building in terror. Suzy is refused entry and has to spend the night in town. Pat goes to a friend's apartment and tells her something sinister is happening at the school. This is the scene to brace for, and it comes right at the start: a shadowy figure ambushes Pat, stabs her repeatedly, and throws her through the apartment building's skylight with a noose around her neck, hanging her. Pat's friend tries to warn the other tenants and is killed when a falling shard of glass impales her.

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Orientation, with maggots

In the morning Suzy goes back to the school, where Miss Tanner runs the classes and Madame Blanc is second-in-command. She is introduced to a servant named Pavlos and to two students, Sara and her new roommate Olga. After a strange run-in with one of the school's matrons and with Blanc's nephew Albert, she faints in dance class. Olga then throws her out of their apartment, so Suzy moves into the school, next door to Sara. One night maggots rain from the ceiling after spoiled food is stored in the attic, and the students sleep in a dance studio. A woman enters the room behind a curtain, and Sara recognizes her breathing as the headmistress, who is supposed to be away. The next day Tanner fires the blind pianist, Daniel, after his German Shepherd bites Albert. That night something stalks Daniel through a plaza, and the dog turns on him and rips out his throat.

Sara's notes go missing

Sara admits to Suzy that she was the voice on the intercom the night Pat died and says Pat had been acting oddly before her death. She promises to show Suzy Pat's notes, but the notes are gone, and an unseen attacker comes into the room and drives her to run. Sara is chased through the school and cornered in the attic. She squeezes out through a small window and drops into a pit of razor wire, and her pursuer finishes her off. Tanner tells Suzy that Sara has simply left, which Suzy doesn't buy. She contacts Sara's psychiatrist friend Frank Mandel, who says a Greek émigrée named Helena Markos founded the school in 1895 and was said to be a witch. Professor Milius, an occult expert, tells her a coven draws its strength from its leader and dies without one.

Following the footsteps to a hidden door

Suzy comes back to find the school empty, because everyone has gone to see the Bolshoi Ballet. She remembers Sara's talk about footsteps and follows the sound to Madame Blanc's office. Pat's last words were "secret" and "iris," so Suzy turns a blue iris painted on a mural and a hidden door opens. Behind it she finds the instructors, led by Blanc, planning her human sacrifice. Albert tips off Pavlos, and Suzy ducks into an alcove, where Sara's disfigured body is waiting. Pavlos chases her to Helena Markos's bedroom, where Suzy recognizes the sleeping Markos by her labored breathing. A decorative peacock breaks and wakes her. Markos becomes invisible, taunts Suzy, and brings Sara's body back to attack her.