Dressed to Kill (1980)
The latest fashion in murder...
The Eighties Yuppie Stalker Movie. Weirdos on the loose. Creepy messages left on white answering machines. Attractive, vulnerable women- trapped alone in luxury apartments. Cue thunder and lightning. Welcome to paranoia. Welcome to America in the 1980s. It’s as if America turned in on itself- danger coming from within, rather than from the outside (as in the Cold War).
The opening titles of The Equalizer (1985-89), a popular American television series starring Edward Woodward as a Jaguar-driving vigilante, features a montage of the New York subway, with a mini-skirted girl stalked in the early hours, on a seemingly deserted station platform- reminiscent, in a way, of The Warriors (1979) in which a New York street gang navigates the Subway over the course of a night; a film condemned at the time for its supposed links to violence, murder and vandalism.
Which takes us to a related genre, the slasher movie. Fashion, style and gratuitous gore: it’s an appealing mix, or at least, to those of us with a penchant for the macabre, the sinister and a healthy dose of black humour. Giallo is the word used to describe low-budget Italian slasher flicks from the 1970s. With the latest Milanese trends, an obsession with the colour red and voyeuristic eroticism, all set to the romantic, upbeat, Euro-chic sound of Ennio Morricone or Bruno Nicolai: an influence on British and American cinema. Don’t Look Now (1973) and The Eyes of Laura Mars (1978) immediately spring to mind.
But if the first twenty minutes or so of Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980) remind you of Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960)- perhaps one of the first ‘slasher’ films- that’s no coincidence: from the dreamy opening close-ups of Angie Dickinson’s nipple in the shower (actually the right-hand nipple of Penthouse Pet of the Month, Victoria Lynn Johnson) to the brilliant art gallery sequence (shot in the Philadelphia Museum of Art): a masterclass in editing, direction and music. And Angie (the Hitchcock Blonde Who Never Was) puts in an equally brilliant performance: deeply sympathetic and vulnerable. Although, alas, as in John Carpenter’s Hallowe’en (1978), female promiscuity never goes unpunished.
Which takes us to psychiatrists. Very much in vogue, a psychiatrist- in the films of the 1980s. Especially lobotomised shrinks, like Roger Moore’s quivering eyebrow in Bryan Forbes’ thriller, The Naked Face (1984), or even perhaps, Roy Scheider in Still of the Night (1982), which also happens to star Meryl Streep. And of course it’s a convenient dramatic convention- the sex-starved, middle-aged housewife throwing herself at the distinguished, understanding- and unavailable- doctor of psychology. With an English accent. In Dressed to Kill, Michael Caine’s consulting rooms (in the basement of an Upper East Side brownstone) are a temple to order and rationality- with shelves spaced with artefacts from the Ancient World, like Sigmund Freud’s flat in Hampstead, an organised leather-bound diary and an immaculate- and unlikely- shaving set (including wickedly sharp razor blade) fitted inside the drawer of an antique mahogany desk, like the suitcase of a spy or an assassin.
Which also brings us to Nancy Allen’s (at that time, Mrs De Palma) performance in Dressed to Kill. She’s terrific. A likeable, sassy, Park Avenue hooker- a role the critics had a problem with; a hooker who invests in modern art and the stock market. And for today’s audience, especially for an earnest, hand-wringing, younger crowd, there are several issues with Dressed to Kill which viewers may find distasteful- especially the awkward transgender aspect, which now sits uncomfortably with modern sensibilities. It’s problematic.
That said, there’s a camp, tongue-in-cheek element to Dressed to Kill; a film which needs to be viewed within the context of its own time. When you think about it, it’s an implausible shooting match, even slightly ludicrous. These are stock characters: the frustrated middle-aged housewife; the angry, working-class Brooklyn detective, the logical British psychiatrist, the nerdy scientific teenager, the tart with the heart. There’s no realism; it’s not Jean Renoir’s The Rules of the Game (1939) or Ken Loach’s Kes (1969). Look, an art house-slasher, perhaps, is not the best film to show to the kiddywinks after a wholesome Christmas lunch. But Dressed to Kill is an intelligent, stylish and beautifully directed film which I like very much indeed. For all its faults. After all, as I’ve said right from the beginning, this is Cinema for Grown-Ups.
Dressed to Kill (1980) is available to watch via Amazon Prime digital download (currently free for Amazon Prime members). It’s also readily available on DVD and Blu-Ray- in various editions.
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Absolutely love this, every film here is a dark, sparkly gem!!
Love this!
And thanks for reminding me of Still of the Night, I must see that again...