Kiss Me Deadly
Ralph Meeker, Albert Dekker, Paul Stewart
Director: Robert Aldrich
Kiss Me Deadly may not be a perfect film, but it has many charming qualities that have elevated it to cult status.
US film critic and historian Steven Scheuer considers it 'the apotheosis' of classic film noir. The black-and-white United Artists picture, directed by Robert Aldrich (Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, The Dirty Dozen), is based on a 1952 novel by Mickey Spillane. It's one of many Spillane novels featuring private detective Mike Hammer.
The film opens with a woman (Cloris Leachman) in a trench coat running in her bare feet down a dark road. Ominous music kicks in. She's desperately trying to flag down a car. The first passes her by, so she runs out onto the road and flings herself in front of the next car, which swerves to avoid hitting her. Enter Hammer. They banter. She gets in the car. I'd Rather Have the Blues by Nat King Cole comes on the car radio as they drive into the night. The lighting, the shots and the music form an engrossing start.
This chance meeting between the woman, Christina, and Hammer sets off a series of events that takes the story through a driving and drinking tour of the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles.
Hammer usually handles divorce cases - as a police officer succinctly and scathingly puts it, 'He's a bedroom dick'. But with this mystery, he feels he's onto something big and he just can't let go. His girl Friday, the sultry Velda (Maxine Cooper), delivers solid leads and pithy lines: 'Do me a favour, will you? Keep away from the windows. Somebody might blow you a kiss.'