Do me a favor, will you? Keep away from the windows. Somebody might... blow you a kiss.
'Kiss Me Deadly'' was ignored when first released but now seems to be a touchstone, a sacred object in the film world. 'Kiss Me Deadly' is the definitive, apocalyptic, nihilistic, science fiction film noir of all time at the close of the classic noir period. Being a huge fan of film noir I bet that this movie is a perfect example of this genre.
People always talk about good endings in film and a lot of these films stick in the mind. By comparison, the beginning of a film is rarely talked about or remembered.
The film opens with a striking pre-credits sequence. A pair of naked feet stumbles and runs down the middle of a lonely highway at night. A near-hysterical, panting, barely-clothed woman with closely-cropped hair who wears only a white trenchcoat, rasps and breathes heavily on the highly-amplified soundtrack as she helplessly tries to flag down passing cars that flash by her. Desperate to get one of the cars to stop she strategically positions herself in the middle of the road by standing and holding her arms out in a V as a two-seated Jaguar sports car/convertible approaches and blinds her in its high-beamed headlights. The driver swerves to avoid the apparition while applying his screeching brakes. His tires squeal as he pulls sharply off the road into a swirling cloud of dust and barely misses running her down. I consider it a perfect opening and the opening which is still talked about in the film circuits even today.
Hard-hitting detective Mike Hammer (Ralph Meeker) takes on thugs and atomic secrets in Robert Aldrich's fast-paced thriller 'Kiss Me Deadly', an adaptation of the Mickey Spillane novel. The night goes awry for Hammer soon after he picks up a scantily clad hitchhiker (Cloris Leachman). The next thing he knows, he's assaulted by a couple of goons and the sultry drifter turns up dead. As Hammer tracks down the murderers, he realizes he is involved in an international conspiracy .'Kiss Me Deadly' boasts nightmarish imagery, a careening, sinuous plot and an unforgettable shock ending.
Filmed in a scant three weeks, 'Kiss Me Deadly' was a late entry into the film noir genre, but it turned out to be one of the most memorable.It's pretty doubtful that anyone at the time realized how important Kiss Me Deadly would loom in coming years. It was lionized by French critics, hailed by French New Wave directors and went on to influence everyone from Martin Scorsese to Quentin Tarantino, Steven Soderbergh to countless up-and-coming directors. I recommend it to anybody who wants to understand just what the whole noir craze is about.
