July 10: #26, Killer's Kiss
“Well
anyway, I guess the whole thing is silly...know a girl for two days
and fall in love.”
Stanley
Kubrick's second feature film Killer's
Kiss
fakes out the viewer as it appears to be another film noir exercise
where nothing works out for anybody until pretty late in the movie.
Still, the black and white film shows off Kubrick making excellent
use of light and shadows and even filming a pretty visceral low-angle
boxing sequence, to boot. Of particular note in the fight is how
Kubrick captures the disorientation of a downed fighter.
However,
the film's acting and dialogue are not particularly memorable, and
are downright bad in scenes such as an early moment where female lead
Irene Kane (playing Gloria, lead character Davey's neighbor) argues
with her employer/lover, the nefarious Vincent Rapallo (played by
Frank Silvera).
For
the sake of the film's very fast pace, Davey and Irene fall in love
literally within a day or two, which Davey himself even mentions as
peculiar a couple of times as the film proceeds. Davey is then
instantly willing to risk it all for his new girlfriend, getting
himself embroiled in serious trouble due to a misunderstanding that
all starts with a stolen scarf on the street.
It's
all a little silly, but Kubrick manages to shine with imaginative
shots such as a wide shot of Vincent's henchmen advancing toward a
cornered man in the darkness and a long, dark alley shot during a
chase scene that gives way to a shot looking down from the fire
escape as Davey scampers up it to get away from his pursuers. There's
some clever, if obvious, symbolism as well (the “Watch Your Step”
sign that's in the foreground midway through the film as Irene
confronts her boss).
At
the end, everything gets tied with a neat little bow and Killer's
Kiss becomes
a film that isn't bad, but is only really notable because of what
Kubrick would do after it.
Grade: C+
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