GamerTab That was an excellent one.

Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Console best movie i've ever seen.

Ariella Broughton It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

ragrost I can't believe I've waited this long to see this noir classic, but as it concluded, I scratched my head and wondered, Had I seen this film before? Yes. Yes I had. Several times, and under several different titles. And they all contain the same protagonist: James Bond.It's hard to believe producer/director Robert Aldrich or screenwriter A.I. Bezzerides hadn't sued United Artists for copyright infringement. From the opening shot to the last frame, every Bond film has borrowed heavily from Kiss Me Deadly. And credit cannot go to the original author of the pulp novel, Mickey Spillane. He has outright panned the film and claims it has little or nothing to do with his book.Let's start with the opening credits, which begin a few minutes into the film: a full-screen crawl, ala Star Wars, but backwards and moving so quickly that it is near impossible to catch all the names on the screen. This must have been one of the first American films to toy with the opening credits in such a bold way, and I can see where Bond took that technique to another level.The torture scenes that follow are unusually explicit for a film of its time. The screams carry on like those in a David Lynch film. Once our protagonist, Mike Hammer, begins his investigation into the events of that fateful night, the similarities to our British spy multiply. He seems to have little regard for women in general, and in a poolside scene littered with a bunch of gangster heavies and their molls, Hammer is greeted by one of the swimsuit-clad ladies and within minutes they are locking lips. Hammer also appears to take pleasure in inflicting pain as evidenced by the scene where he crushes a man's hand in a desk drawer. It reminded me of the fight scene in the elevator with Sean Connery.The use of a jazz score, although not the first to do so, is very reminiscent of the early Bond films, and the scene with the nightclub singer probably inspired the Bond opening title sequence. Probably the most obvious similarity must be in the way the final scenes played out. At the 3/4 point in the film, Hammer's right hand gal, Velda, gets kidnapped by the henchmen, like all Bond girls do, and is held captive at a secret lair. Hammer tracks her down, breaks in, is held at gunpoint and witnesses the villain's unveiling of the coveted McGuffin, in this instance, a case with a supernatural glow and ominous sounds emanating from within. The villain ultimately gets what's coming to her, the place begins to explode, Bond, I mean Hammer, goes in search of his partner, whisks her away from the inferno and they both watch as the structure burns to the ground. At that point I was half expecting a parachute to drop out of the sky with a phone attached and M on the other line.

gavin6942 A doomed female hitchhiker (Cloris Leachman) pulls Mike Hammer (Ralph Meeker) into a deadly whirlpool of intrigue, revolving around a mysterious "great whatsit." The film withstood scrutiny from the Kefauver Commission (who investigated the mafia), which called it a film designed to ruin young viewers, leading director Aldrich to protest the Commission's conclusions. Today, the film is preserved by the Library of Congress. We can see who won in the long run."Kiss Me Deadly" remains one of the great time capsules of Los Angeles and Beverly Hills; the Bunker Hill locations were all destroyed when the downtown neighborhood was razed in the late 1960s.Homage is paid to the glowing suitcase MacGuffin in the 1984 cult film "Repo Man", the film "Ronin", and in Tarantino's film "Pulp Fiction". The "shiny blue suitcase" is referenced with other famous MacGuffins in "Guardians of the Galaxy". In the film "Southland Tales", Richard Kelly pays homage to the film, showing the main characters watching the beginning on their television and later the opening of the case is shown on screens on board the mega-Zeppelin.This is, indeed, the greatest of all private eye stories and film noir. With all due respect to such greats as "Asphalt Jungle", this is the real deal.

xisca-pap What makes this film really special is the direction and the characters. The plot itself is not that interesting per se. I have not read the novel but the story in the film is not very coherent and the involvement of the various characters in the plot is not clear at all. Curiously, though, the director does not seem to be interested in clarifying it. Instead, he builds on the ambiguity to create a universe that revolves around something that everyone thinks so important as to sacrifice their life or that of those around them for it, but no one understands what it is.In terms of the superb direction, I think it is worth pointing out that a few ideas and styles in this film seem to have been of great influence to the work of David Lynch. On the superficial side the opening credits immediately bring to my mind the Lost Highway. The mix of noir and such high levels of ambiguity, often with allusions to the supernatural, characterises the best of Lynch's work. I even found the amalgam of Cristina and Lily/Gabriel to be a prototype to Dorothy Vallens.

braddugg I must confess that, with this film I have seen a good noir film that is well nuanced and spine chilling.From the titles in the beginning to the final frozen frame, there is a sense of mystique that prevails. It helped me hang for the whole length of the film and I felt grateful at the end. The film poster itself has too many details that need some good time to decipher.To begin with, it's all in the writing of the script and placing them well in screenplay. Now, this film has done that part exceptionally well. Dialogues are good and they carry a certain intrigue that made me hold back to the whole length of the film.It has many undertones and many references too. It's disapproving of many conventional film making norms that were there in 1950's. But in the same structure, the body and the heart of the this film are radically different and we have been offered a very niche film. It's classically noir and it's classically left for viewers interpretation.The end climax is debatable and left me with questions. That's the kind of film that I like. The good films are good, but the great ones start asking questions about why anything happened. They start a debate internally within the mind and even with others, when you discuss about the film. Thus, this definitely is a great film.With sharp editing and superb cinematography, this film is a landmark technically in 1950's. The production design is wonderful too. All kudos to the technical team who have got the infrastructure of this film together.The acting, the nuances of emotions are done well by all the actors. Though, Ralph Meeker as Mike Hammer stole the show.Great work by Robert Aldrich the director and great work by Criterion in giving us the film unedited, with even the alternative ending preserved. This is not a film for general viewers, it's strictly for aficionados.A 5/5 for a definitive, science fiction, noir film. http://braddugg.blogspot.in/