YMMV / Opera (1987)

• Awesome Moments: More a particularly tense and well-done moment than a character's defining awesome moment, but the scene where Mira and Betty are being stalked by the killer in Betty's apartment is extremely creepy, well-shot, and tense.
• Anti-Climax Boss: Santini. He manages to kill Marco, basically the last person between him and Betty, and before he kills her too, he's duped by Betty long enough for her to stun him with a rock before he's arrested by a swarm of cops.
• Awesome Ego: Marco. He goes overboard in the visuals for the opera, having been a horror film director, and insults Guilia's costumes, as well as seemingly wanting to get into Betty's pants in the early goings because of her innocent nature, but he proves by the end of the film that he has Betty's safety and interest purely at heart.
• Complete Monster: Inspector Alan Santini was a Serial Killer in a relationship with heroine Betty's mother. He would tie up women and kill them while she watched. After she pressured him to do it more often, he got fed up with her ordering him and killed her as well. Deciding to make Betty his new target, Santini stalks her at the opera house she is performing at and murders people in front of her after tying her up and forcing her eyes open so she sees everything. He kills three ravens during his murder spree, and eventually sets a room on fire to threaten Betty's life and fake his own death. Then he pursues her all the way to the Swiss Alps to make her his, and while he's unsuccessful on that front, he does seemingly shatter her mind and kill her romantic interest Marco before finally being apprehended.
• Genius Bonus: First time eagle-eyed viewers may notice the film uses many POV shots to let the audience know we're seeing things through the eyes of the killer. Right after Betty's successful opening night, we get one of these POV shots as Guilia is ranting about her hatred of Marco. The POV starts to move towards Betty's dressing room door after Guilia leaves. When the scene cuts to Betty responding to a knock on her door, she opens it up to reveal Insp. Santini standing outside to congratulate her and get her autograph. It's a clear bit of foreshadowing that Santini is the killer, since it's the only time it happens when the POV is not clearly from the killer's perspective or flashback. The only other time it happens is when Mira comes to get Betty to take the stage for the first performance, and she's later killed off.
• Realism-Induced Horror: While played to the extreme, plenty of actors and actresses have fans that may or may not be mentally unbalanced, and the film shows us, in part, what a deranged fan COULD do to the actress in question and the people she knows if he became unbalanced enough by seeing her...And if the cops are semi-useless, Or if the deranged fan in question was the investigating officer on the slasher case...
• Squick: The raven gobbling up Santini's eyeball.
• Tough Act to Follow: It’s often seen as Argento’s last masterpiece. His later films have been met with mixed reactions by critics and his fans alike.

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