One of my all time favorites.

It's funny watching the elements come together in this complicated scam. On one hand, the set-up isn't quite as complex as it seems, but there's an easy sense of fun in every exchange.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Oct 2014:Watching the movie late at night for the 2014 October Horror Challenge on the IMDb Horror board (RIP) I found it to hardly leave me with any lasting memories, partly due to being tied,but also due to the flick being so disconnected from the other two in the series.Feb 9th 2017:Whilst trying to decide which of the last 4 titles (one alt cut,and two in need of re-watching) from auteur film maker Dario Argento,I read a review from a fellow IMDber on Argento's Dracula,who said it was not as "entertaining or gratuitous as his bonkers Mother of Tears." After reading this,I decided to pay another visit to the final mother with a new mindset.The plot:Sent an urn recently dug up that is believed to contain artefacts belonging to the mythical "Third Mother/Mother of Tears" Mater Lachrymarum, art restoration student Sarah Mandy opens the urn with a curator . Accidentally cutting herself during the opening, (woops!) Mandy's blood leads to Lachrymarum's henchmen coming to life and killing the curator. Running away,Mandy soon discovers from ghosts of the past that she is the only one who can stop the mother crying.View on the film:Whilst stripping the film of the distinctive appearance of Suspiria and Inferno,co-writer (along with Jace Anderson / Walter Fasano/ Adam Gierasch and Simona Simonetti) director Dario Argento & cinematographer Frederic Fasano unearth a dusty, golden appearance that keeps the horrors linked to the nightmare unearthed. Tearing the limbs out of anything even slightly subtle,Argento attacks the low budget for a piece of gloriously weird,pure Horror kitsch. Making the end of the world look like a Friday night out,Argento jumps over the limited extras with practical bonkers delights,from gallons of over the top gore and bad CGI ghosts,to a random cheeky monkey and the witches looking like a Goth band.Criss-crossed from various screenplays written over 30 years,the writers struggle to keep any of the original elements of the first two films intact,with bone-dry scenes involving "research" featuring characters showing illustrations in books for scenes the budget can't cover. Rolling down an Adventure Horror path,the writers push the mammoth flaws aside for hilariously odd shocks,that leaps from Mandy fighting hobos on the eve of the apocalypse,to Mandy being unable to spank a demonic monkey. Reuniting with her dad, (who lingers a bit too long at her naked body) sexy Asia Argento gives a fittingly peculiar performance as Mandy,who largely appears oddly relaxed at the end of the world,as her dad closes the urn on The Three Mothers.

It took me several viewings of Argento's final film in his Three Mothers trilogy before I finally arrived at a sure, albeit ambivalent, conclusion.The "plot", as they call it, involves an ancient urn which causes the city of Rome to erupt into violence. Robbery and murder run amok and it's all the result of Mater Lachrymarum (the Mother of Tears.) It's ultimately up to a young art student by the name of Sarah Mandy to stop the chaos. Asia Argento plays the role of Sarah. I don't think Asia is without talent (I enjoyed her performances in Trauma and the Stendhal Syndrome – two earlier Argento efforts.) But while she shouldn't entirely be held at fault here, her performance isn't exactly great. She frequently comes across as wooden, although I believe much of this is a result of the poor dialogue. And perhaps more importantly, her wooden delivery and still fairly thick Italian accent give the proceedings quite a bit of charm. I wouldn't say her performance enhances the film, but I suppose her looks are enough to keep the film going. Adam James' character is boring and not at all engaging; this is true even when we're given the chance to poke fun at him. He does nothing for me, and, at best, is forgettable. And then there's Udo Kier. Doing what he does best, he's over the top enough to be memorable, but he somehow never crosses into "too ridiculous" territory. His screen time is short but worthwhile. One of Mother of Tear's saving graces is its gore. Gone is Germano Natali's (Deep Red, Suspiria) garish, paint-like blood (excellent in its own right); instead, Argento opts for a more Fulci-esque display of bloody mayhem. The camera lingers on every moment of gory detail. Argento has rarely been this brutal; there are plenty of memorable moments for gore hounds and the film's first big sequence is a perfect example. Mother of Tears' soundtrack frequently pays homage to Argento's past supernatural related works. The music during the aforementioned first murder sequence is a clear nod to Suspiria's over-the-top, yet haunting operatic music. And later scenes do more than enough to hint at Inferno's piano-based instrumentals. Overall, the film does a good job score-wise.From a visual standpoint, Mother of Tears is hardly lacking. It may not have the Technicolor look of Suspiria or the nuanced production design of Inferno, but it's hardly dull. It takes some of the artsy indoor/outdoor scenes of The Stendhal Syndrome and combines it with the more elaborate set-pieces found in previous "mother" films. Overall, Mother of Tears is a mixed bag. It has its boring moments, but it's also a good example of Italian Horror's love for grandeur and charming carelessness toward what is considered logical or politically correct. Those comparing it to films of Argento's golden era need to stop living in the past. Mother of Tears has its great moments and not so great moments and it is neither a failure nor a rousing success. If you're a fan of 80s "godfather of gore" era Fulci and take into account the 21st century's distinct lack of anything Giallo/Italian Horror-related, Mother of Tears is worth a watch.

I feel I should first mention that I am not an authority on Dario Argento - I've only seen a few of his movies in my life, though I admired what I saw. But I feel I should also mention that those movies of his I saw before "Mother of Tears" were his *older* movies. I had heard that his more recent movies were not that good, so I avoided them. But when I found "Mother of Tears" at my library, I decided to give it a look.After seeing it, I think I can understand why so many Argento fans have been disappointed with his recent movies. In fairness, I didn't find the movie completely bad. It gets off to a good start, being intriguing and fast-paced. But not long into the movie, things fall apart. The low budget of the enterprise is pretty evident, such as the fact Argento isn't able to show much of the scale of the horrible things happening in Rome (we mostly have to hear about it.) There also isn't that much atmosphere built by Argento. The biggest problem with the movie is that it soon becomes slow and boring for the most part. True, there are some gross and/or shocking bits (particularly one scene with a baby), but this stuff only consists of a little bit of the movie. More likely than not you'll come extremely close to nodding off while watching.

Filmmaker Dario Argento's concluding film in his "Three Mothers" trilogy (also featuring "Suspiria" (1977) and "Inferno" (1980)) is definitely not in the same league as the first two films. It's a certifiably wild and over the top succession of morbid images that does boast a certain degree of showmanship. Dario's daughter Asia stars as Sarah Mandy, a student of art restoration and archaeology in Rome who comes into possession of some ancient artifacts, the discovery of which spells doom for everybody as Mater Lachrymarum, the third of the deadly Three Mothers, visits evil upon the city of Rome; suicide is rampant and hostilities flare. Sarah, whose mother had once fought the forces of evil, eventually realizes that it's all on her to save the day, although she does get some help along the way, from people like Marta Colussi (Valeria Cavalli), Detective Enzo Marchi (Cristian Solimeno), and Father Johannes (Udo Kier, who'd previously been featured in "Suspiria"). Kier isn't around for very many scenes, but he's always welcome no matter how small his part may be, and it's also worth it just to see Asia share some scenes with her real-life mom Daria Nicolodi, who plays her mom in the film. As one can expect from a Dario Argento film, there's not a whole lot of sense here, and the spectacle does overwhelm what attempts are made at exposition. One very unfortunate fact here is that this is nowhere near as thickly atmospheric and beautifully lit as "Suspiria" or "Inferno"; this also does not have the feel of a freaky fairy tale as its predecessors, functioning in a very modern mode. Asia tries, but is not as engaging a presence as Jessica Harper or Irene Miracle. Composer Claudio Simonetti's work is of course good but just not that memorable. At the least, horror fans can delight in a film that delivers gore by the bucketful; some of it is so outrageous that it will have them roaring with appreciative laughter. And one thing that deserves a mention is that Moran Atias is far and away the sexiest of these three Mothers, looking quite delectable in her birthday suit. Dario does give the proceedings a fairly apocalyptic feel, and there is some delicious nastiness in the insane climax, but the ending is overall not terribly satisfying. People who love and admire Dario's previous films in this series may regard this as a real comedown, but taken for what it is, it's pretty entertaining. Seven out of 10.