Not forgotten by any means, but maybe you haven't seen it lately. Well, now's your chance, what with the release of this new Criterion Collection Blu-Ray edition. It looks great, as you'd expect, and it's just as outrageous and entertaining as ever, from the Cloris Leachman-naked-under-the- overcoat scene to the explosive conclusion. The movie follows the book's story fairly closely, and though the shift in location from New York to L. A. is a little bothersome to me, it works pretty well. Part of the film's original ending is included, too.The commentators, on the other hand, leave me cold. They don't seem to have read Spillane, and their ignorance of him and his work is sadly depressing. Their opinions of Hammer run along the lines of those in the accompanying booklet, in which J. Hoberman says the film "tracks one of the sleaziest, stupidest, most brutal detectives in American movies." Hoberman also calls Hammer "a crass private-eye."
Luckily, Max Allan Collins' Spillane documentary (Mike Hammer's Mickey Spillane) is included among the special features on the DVD to provide a little balance. This documentary (re-edited to about 40 minutes from the original) alone is a great reason to buy the DVD if you haven't seen it. Makes me wish for a Criterion Collection edition of The Girl Hunters.
The entire package is well worth your time and highly recommended in spite of the shortcomings I mentioned. Just don't listen to the commentary.
9 comments:
J. Hoberman is one of the "critics" for whom ignorance is a virtue.
I started reading one of Hoberman's movie books (as recommended by G. Kelley) but early on I found - among the admittedly fascinating details of Communists in Hollywood - a lot of sloppy "research" that pulled me out of the book.
He seems to be under the impression that James Whitmore won an Oscar (rather than the nomination he actually got) for Best Supporting Actor for BATTLEGROUND. Even with my generic knowledge I knew this was wrong, yet Hoberman repeated it twice.
KISS ME DEADLY was a classic, whatever you might think of Hammer and Spillane in general. There are scenes I remember vividly decades later.
Jeff
This one I have seen and it's a dandy.
Love Kiss Me Deadly. Funny you should mention The Girl Hunters. I never liked the movie and thought that Spillane could barely act. But he's the Hammer in my head when I read the books. Must have been those beer commercials.
I'm ordering it now!
I'm surprised you haven't heard from those who love Spillane and hate this adaptation (Aldrich reportedly didn't like Spillane's novel much)...almost as easy to start an argument with this one as with THE LONG GOODBYE.
I must admit the one tic I found distracting about this one is the lighter thing. Kind of like how Spade keeps rolling his own in THE MALTESE FALCON only moreso.
KMD has one of my favorite lines of movie dialogue, Hammer to the two henchmen, Sugar and Charlie: "For a couple of cannons, you guys are pretty polite."
Saw this one for the first time recently and really enjoyed it. So over the top from start to finish that the apocalyptic ending fits right in. Would like to have seen Leachman get the bigger role.
One of the greatest of the 1950s ... science fiction movies. Uh-huh.
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