KISS ME DEADLY
US, 1955, 105 minutes, Black and white.
Ralph Meeker, Cloris Leachman, Albert Dekker, Wesley Addy, Paul Stewart, Strother Martin.
Directed by Robert Aldrich.
Kiss Me Deadly is one of three films produced by English director Victor Saville in the mid '50s, based on Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer stories. The other films were I the Jury and The Long Wait. Spillane's stories were not to come to the fore until the '80s with Stacy Keach in a television series and Armand Assante in a remake of I the Jury.
In their time they were hard bitten private eye stories. In retrospect, they seem a touch gentlemanly with Ralph Meeker's Mike Hammer usually wearing coat and tie. Even though he slaps people around a bit, makes a line for the ladies, it now seems very restrained. So does the plot involving robbery of some nuclear material far to readily available and destructive, especially with special effects, of the villainess.
What is striking about the film is the black and white photography as well as the direction of Robert Aldrich, using the black and white, light and shadows, angles, pacing and editing. Aldrich was at the beginning of his career with such films as Apache, Vera Cruz, The Big Knife, Attack. He was to have some spectacular success in the '60s with such films as Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte and, his most well known film, The Dirty Dozen.
1. The film noir of the 1940s and '50s? The private eye, his tough style, the loner? The relationship with the police? With women? With criminals especially with the femme fatale? Kiss Me Deadly as a Mickey Spillane variation on this genre?
2. The black and white photography, light and shadow, angles, editing and pace? The musical score?
3. The title and its evocative tone of sex and violence?
4. The prologue: Christina on the road, Mike Hammer almost crashing, her incoherence, the references to Christina Rossetti and Remember Me? Her giving the letter at the gas station? Their being taken, tortured, her death? The car over the cliff and Mike Hammer seemingly dead?
5. Mike Hammer as the Mickey Spillane hero? Tough and laconic (though well dressed and with a fine apartment)? His relationship with Pat and the police? With Valda and her assistants? The authorities disliking him because of his divorce case work? His memory of Christina and his wanting to be involved?
6. His investigations: finding Caver as Christina's roommate? Believing her, helping her, taking her to the apartment? The irony of her being the femme fatale and the villain? Her confrontation of the doctor? Her greed, shooting the doctor, being killed by the radiation?
7. The convoluted plot: the criminals and their pursuit of Hammer, his being taken to the beach house, his fight and escape? His later being taken again, the fight on the beach? The confrontation with the criminals and their deaths?
8. The relationship with Valda, always relying on her? Her work, shrewdness, getting the information, passing it on?
9. The background of the boxing world and the fights? Information from the health club? The radioactive material in the locker? The number of deaths? Mike Hammer and his finally rescuing Valda, seeing Caver's death? Their escape from the burning house onto the beach and the sudden ending?
10. The films being considered violent and aggressive in their day? In the light of the private eye tradition? And later developments?
