Movie Review: Body Double (1984)

Stylish but deeply flawed, Body Double is director Brian De Palma's attempt to modernize Hitchcock by introducing a potent dose of sexuality and a sharper instrument of death. Uninspired performances and a plot that crumbles under close inspection undermine the pizzazz.

Jake (Craig Wasson) is finding out just how bad a failing Hollywood career can get: reduced to playing the vampire in a Grade Z slasher flick, claustrophobia paralyzes him while he is entombed in his casket. Then he catches his girlfriend in bed with another guy, before being utterly humiliated in an acting class. Forced to abandon his apartment, Jake seems to catch a break when shady fellow-actor Sam (Gregg Henry) offers him the chance to house-sit a stunning villa with a breathtaking view. The major perk: sexy neighbour Gloria (Deborah Shelton) puts on a solo striptease show in front of her window every night, and Sam encourages Jake to watch through the conveniently available telescope.

Jake helps himself to the nightly eye candy, and quickly notices that Gloria is being dangerously stalked by one ugly looking Indian. Jake starts stalking both Gloria and her stalker, following them through a mall and on the beach, and is indecisive as to whether to interfere or not. It doesn't matter much: the following night Gloria is gruesomely murdered by the Indian, while Jake watches helplessly through the telescope. But many things are not what they seem: Jake discovers that porn star Holly Body (Melanie Griffith) was unwittingly duping him into witnessing a carefully staged murder. Jake has to unravel all the lies that he is being subjected to, and in the process both he and Holly become targets for the murderer.

De Palma imports at least a couple of classic Hitcockian themes: the Rear Window witness-to-a-murder, and the Vertigo acrophobia here becomes claustrophobia. There are other small touches, including the murder-on-the-phone from Dial M For Murder. But from the opening scenes De Palma also litters his movie with what-you-see-is-not-real references, and the mix of modernized Hitchcockian elements and almost overt winking at the audience just doesn't bake well.

Unfortunately, Body Double may have one of De Palma's all-time weakest casts. Craig Wasson , Gregg Henry and Deborah Shelton take up a lot of oxygen and deliver precious little presence in return. Wasson floats through the film in a vacuous state; Henry hisses slimy evil intent; and former beauty queen Shelton stares blankly out of her mesmerizing eyes, gradually realizing that television is going to be the only place where her lack of acting talent will flourish. Melanie Griffith arrives late and immediately injects a much needed shot of wicked edginess and sly humour, but by the time she makes her entrance, the pervasive bland acting delivered by everyone else has already suffocated the film.

With character behaviour straight out of a first year writing class for the imagination-challenged, Body Double is left with only it's emphasis on style to save it, and here De Palma does score points. The film oozes sleek extravagance, from the ridiculously attractive design of the look-out house to the sensual voyeuristic scenes and the sojourn into the ultra-expensive mall, De Palma layers luxury that, through Jake's eyes, is inaccessible to most mortals.

Body Double is more of an interesting curiosity than a good film, a bit of an unkempt cul-de-sac on the otherwise generally well-maintained De Palma career avenue.

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Movie Review: Carrie (1976)

A chilling horror film that is both a psychological and physical terror ride, Carrie combines the worst nightmares of any young girl: awkward puberty, bullying by the meanest of classmates, parental religious terrorism, and prom night turning into torment. That Carrie White discovers a way to extract a brutal revenge on all who abuse her through telekinesis just makes Brian De Palma's task of creating a frightfest so much more fun.

Based on the Stephen King novel, the movie opens with withdrawn and friendless high schooler Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) discovering her first period in the gym shower, and being traumatized when her mean classmates, including Chris (Nancy Allen) and Sue (Amy Irving) throw tampons at her. As the gym teacher Miss Collins (Betty Buckley) tries to make amends and help Carrie out of her shell, Carrie begins to discover that she has the telekinetic power to physically move objects through mind control. Carrie's real problem is her uncompromisingly stern mother Margaret (Piper Laurie), a sexually repressed religious zealot who abuses her daughter.

Sue feels some regret at the mistreatment of Carrie, and to make amends, convinces her popular boyfriend Tommy (William Katt) to ask Carrie out to the prom. But Chris is much more intent to continue the bullying, and plots with her boyfriend Billy (John Travolta) a most humiliating climax to Carrie's prom night. Carrie enjoys most of her evening with Tommy, the one and only successful social event in her life, but when Chris turns the prom from dream to nightmare, Carrie unleashes her telekinetic power to extract a most violent revenge.

Sissy Spacek was 26 years old when she portrayed high school student Carrie White, and her performance is unforgettably disturbing. Acting with haunted eyes, a frail physique, and long, uncared-for hair, Spacek's sheer presence foretells disturbing obscurity and impending doom in equal measures. Spacek is matched by an unhinged, over-the-top performance from Piper Laurie as Carrie's mother Margaret, a religious fundamentalist who embraces all the most twisted interpretations of sin and guilt associated with sexuality and dumps them on her daughter. The scenes of Margaret terrorizing Carrie with her religious dogma are more disturbing than all the blood that De Palma throws onto the screen.

And De Palma is the third star of the movie, using slow motion, camera rotation, and point-of-view shots to great effect. He boosts the impact of the horror sequences by juxtaposing them with tranquil scenes, or by deliciously prolonging the set-up prior to unleashing the inevitable shocks.

Carrie's secondary characters are brought to life by a lively group of actors, many of whom achieved varying degrees of fame. This was John Travolta's last film prior to shooting into superstardom with Saturday Night Fever, while Nancy Allen, Amy Irving , P.J. Soles and William Katt would go to on build modestly interesting movie profiles. Betty Buckley had an excellent stage, screen and television career, and Priscilla Pointer (Irving's real-life mother) was most famous for a role on TV's Dallas.

Many hidden meanings can be layered into Carrie's story, from her entire experience being a metaphor for the sacrifices of womanhood, to the societal damage caused by religious extremism and the equating of sexuality with sin. The hints of subtext bubbling below the surface provide an added edge of enjoyment to the unfolding tragedy.

Carrie is a classic horror film, compact, on-target, unsettling and unforgettable.

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Movie Review: The Untouchables (1987)

Written by Dave Mamet, directed by Brian De Palma, music by Ennio Morricone, and starring Kevin Costner, Sean Connery, Robert De Niro and Andy Garcia; The Untouchables is a stellar crime drama with talent to spare on both sides of the camera.

Only loosely inspired by real events, The Untouchables is set in the Chicago of the early 1930s: Al Capone (Robert De Niro) effectively runs the town, his empire drawing enormous wealth from control of the illegal alcohol trade and destroying any and all opponents with an iron fist wrapped around a Tommy Gun.

With all local officials and the police force on Capone's payroll, Federal Treasury Agent Elliott Ness (Costner) is dispatched to Chicago on a mission to put an end to Capone's reign.  He teams up with beat cop Jim Malone (Connery), trainee sharp shooter George Stone (Garcia) and federal accountant Oscar Wallace (Charles Martin Smith). After initial set-backs, the foursome succeed in disrupting Capone's operations, capturing or killing many of his men and seizing illegal alcohol shipments. Attempts to corrupt Ness and his team fail, and they earn the reputation as untouchable. With his empire threatened, Capone fights back.

The Untouchables is a high speed trip through the wild streets of a lovingly recreated and crime-infested Chicago.  With a streak of mean humour embedded deep within all the violence, Mamet's script never lags, and reaches several breathtaking highlights, artistically delivered by De Palma: Ness and his men raiding an illegal alcohol deal at the Canadian border, with Malone subsequently torturing a corpse for good effect; Malone attempting to fend-off assassins at his apartment earned Connery the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor; Ness and Stone capturing Capone's well-guarded bookkeeper at the epic Union Station shoot-out is an all-time classic scene. And the final rooftop confrontation between Ness and Frank Nitti, Capone's most lethal henchman, is a satisfying end to the carnage.

With The Untouchables setting its sight firmly on capturing the spirit rather than the reality of an era, Connery and De Niro deliver the flashy performances while Costner and Garcia anchor the rest of the cast. All the actors are to varying degrees over-the-top, but in the context of a movie brimming with kinetic energy, exaggerated performances are what was needed to avoid being overwhelmed.

Morricone weaves his spaghetti western themes with a 1930s mood to provide an evocative soundtrack to the proceedings.

Elliott Ness memorably got his man; The Untouchables stylishly got all the necessary details right.

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