Dressed to Kill (Brian de Palma, 1980)

Is Brian de Palma a great filmmaker? This is a question I’ve been pondering for a few of his movies lately. To answer this question, let’s first ask: What makes a great filmmaker? Film is usually a sum of script (originality), scenes (directing), editing, acting, decors, music etc. In my opinion de Palma is not ‘mastering’ all these aspects, but I do believe he is a great director. Dressed to Kill is a perfect illustration of this statement. It lacks originality, but excels in style.

In the opening scene we see a woman (Angie Dickinson) in the shower getting raped. This turns out to be a dream/fantasy for who appears to be our protagonist. She is sexually unsatisfied, as she discusses with her psychiatrist dr. Ellliott (Michael Caine). As a result she picks up a guy in a museum in a scene which is almost literally taken from Hitchcock’s Vertigo, but is directed to perfection by de Palma (just like in its source material). The next morning when she wants to leave the stranger’s apartment she gets killed with a razor in the elevator. (In a scene that, is again, directed brilliantly, but not original). So we have seen a woman who appears to be the protagonist of this film, but gets killed sooner than expected (sounds familiar?).

This ruthless elevator massacre is partly witnessed by a cute prostitute (Nancy Allen, de Palma’s wife at the time) who the movie will revolve around for the rest of its time and is seen as the main suspect by police detective Marino (Dennis Franz, who I think was born to be playing a cop). She is in great danger, since the killer (who appears to be a blonde lady) saw her near the elevator. With help of the victim’s genius son she tries to identify the killer, to prove her innocence.

Dressed to Kill is not the first and definitely not the last movie where de Palma is copying Alfred Hitchcock. And here we have a great director quoting a great filmmaker. Hitchcock his movies are highly original, perfectly balanced and therefore visionary. De Palma is copying his style and tries to use it in his own story, but this is where he can’t distinguish himself. Despite some brilliantly directed scenes the movie as a whole doesn’t seem to hold the suspense. Its plot is simply too predictable and sometimes unlikely. Without spoiling, the final scene of the movie is again, well directed, but a bit lame. If we look at de Palma’s total oeuvre he made some good movies, but I don’t think he ever wrote an original script that was really good (his Femme Fatale from 2002 may come close…).

I wouldn't consider de Palma one of the greatest filmmakers, but he should rank high as a great director. Some of his scenes are superb in building suspense. Think about the scenes on the stairs in both The Untouchables and the Black Dahlia, the break-in in Mission: Impossible and the awesome camerawork in the 'hit-scene' in Snake Eyes. Some of the movies I just named, are pretty far from high quality movies, but are memorable because of some of those awesome scenes. Thanks to a great director using his typical long takes, split-screens and suspenseful music.

Dressed to Kill is definitely not a masterpiece, but it is entertaining and eye-candy for style freaks.

7/10