Brian De Palma is an anomaly. He’s clearly part of the whole Scorsese-Coppola era, but he’s gone from being the naughty little brother that everyone tries to ignore to being the crazy old uncle that everyone does ignore. He never made anything weighty in the sense the others did, and so he was never taken quite seriously. He was — and he remains — first and foremost a stylist. Any message he was trying to deliver — and, yes, I think there is one — was secondary to swirling camerawork, elaborate traveling shots, and general panache. Subtlety was rarely in his lexicon. He prefers genre works — horror movies and thrillers (often with horrific elements). Logic and construction tend to either defeat him, or just not interest him. He’d rather be clever. He wears his influences on his sleeve. He’s an odd blend of esoterica and pop culture — with a kind of exploitation mentality. He likes naked girls and he likes gore and improbable puzzles. Put bluntly, he just ain’t respectable. This has not prevented De Palma from creating a unique and often fascinating body of work.
I’m not quite a four-square fan. My introduction to him was Phantom of the Paradise (1974), which I saw first-run at least twice and then many times during the days of the midnight cult movie. It probably remains my favorite — nearly matched by Carrie (1976). Those are my De Palma touchstone works — the ones I never tire of and have no reservations about. After that, it gets tricky, but I’m finding increased admiration for much of his subsequent work and am slowly reassessing it. Well, I’m reassessing some of it. I have no interest in revisiting Scarface (1983) or Raising Cain (1992). That brings us to Body Double, which I more or less enjoyed when it came out, but didn’t think was by any means great. I liked it enough, however, to pick it up for five bucks when I came across it in a Wal-Mart dump bin — and then promptly left on the shelf for years before getting around to actually watching it. I’m sorry I waited. I’m not sure it’s a great film, but it might be a great movie, and it’s definitely great De Palma. It’s also neck and neck with his much-maligned The Black Dahlia (2006) for the screwiest picture he ever made — but it’s a lot more fun.
Body Double is over-plotted, overheated, and like Dressed to Kill (1980) suffers from a surprise ending that isn’t really all that much of a surprise. It’s a subversive thriller that wallows — rather gleefully — in the seedier side of Hollywood — from sleazy exploitation horror movies to the porn industry. (Where someone like Paul Schrader got all righteously indignant over porn in his angry 1979 Hardcore, De Palma just jumps right in and shoots his own — R rated — little porno movie.) The plot is kind of like Vertigo on acid — but with a giant drill. Just think of it in those terms and you’ll be OK. Sort of.
The Thursday Horror Picture Show will screen Body Double Thursday, April 9, at 8 p.m. in Theater Six at The Carolina Asheville and will be hosted by Xpress movie critics Ken Hanke and Justin Souther.
That was a lot of fun. I was reminded of how much I saw this on Showtime/The Movie Channel when it was new. It also made me miss directors who take long takes and demand professional actors and the patience of the audience. What made you go with this over Dressed to Kill, Blow Up, or the afore mentioned Rasiing Cain? (I thought the latter was phenomenal when I saw it in a theatre on a stormy night)
Well, we’ve done Dressed to Kill. We’ll get to Blow Up. Raising Cain, on the other hand, I think is truly awful. I remember seeing it with my daughter when it was just out and laughing at how utterly predictable everything in it was.
Blow Up is my favorite De Palma and Scarface might be my least favorite, but I haven’t seen very many of his films.
Top of the list are Phantom of the Paradise and Carrie.
EDWIN , IT IS BLOW OUT NOT BLOW UP , YOU ARE CONFUSED WITH THE TITLE
Thanks you, Abigail, though I don’t think it was necessary to shout.
Also, if you scroll down a few comments, you’ll see that we corrected ourselves.
Phantom of the Paradise is fun, I like Blow Up too. I was watching an interview between Depalma and Baumbach on Youtube and realized there is a lot of lesser known films of his from the 70’s that sound like they would be really good.
Home Movies sounds really interesting, but hard to find.
Most of those films are…well, disappointing.
Whoops! Just realized we’re all saying Blow Up when we mean Blow Out.
Since we were talking De Palma, my mind corrected it.
Right. I knew what we were talking about the whole time, especially since I haven’t seen the Antonioni film.
If you feel compelled to see an Antonioni movie, that’s probably the one to see.
I haven’t seen any by him.
Thats a big blind spot Edwin, the ones I’ve seen are Red Desert, Blow Out, Zabriskie Point, The Passenger, and I’ve seen some of Eros on TV. I would recommend Blow Out first and then The Passenger.
Thank you for your judgment.
Ha, I did say Blow Up didn’t I. I like both, but I would still go with Blow Up over Blow Out.
Speaking of blind spots — what Murnau, Borzage, Sternberg, Lubitsch, and Mamoulian have have you seen?
Crickets…
Maybe he’s been busy catching up these past nine months.
Uh…sure.