THE supernatural horror flick “The Mother of Tears” is very much an Italian-family affair. Asia Argento stars; her father, horror maestro Dario, directs; and Asia’s mother and Dario’s longtime partner, Daria Nicolodi, co-stars as . . . Asia’s mom.
Too bad the family portrait isn’t something the Argentos can look back on fondly.
An ancient urn is unearthed in Rome, unleashing a witch, a tall bald dude and a screaming monkey. It plunges the Eternal City into a reign of death and destruction (par for the course for an Argento movie). Student Sarah Mandy (played by Asia, looking thinner than usual) thinks she can set things right and finds herself being chased around town by a bunch of bad people.
Dario unleashes his whole bag of horror tricks, including having his daughter do a nude shower scene influenced by Hitchcock’s “Psycho” and forcing her to trudge through a river of human excrement. And there is, of course, a maximum of blood and gore. Sometimes the director’s ideas work; often they don’t.
The film lacks the visual class of previous Argento efforts and relies more on shocks than suspense. Worst of all, the version opening here has been dubbed into English (a crime that should be punishable by death)!
And wouldn’t you just know it? The Weinsteins have a hand in the movie’s distribution.
THE MOTHER OF TEARS
Crying shame.Running time: 98 minutes. Not rated (bloody violence). At the Sunshine, Houston Street near Second Avenue.