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Insomnia is real pain in the ass. There's nothing worse than having to go to court to fight a public urination ticket on no sleep. When you have bags under your eyes and your temper is sharpened by 84 minutes of rest with no nocturnal emission, of course you're going to look like guy who struggleed to muster enough piss to blast off on a Lexus.
Good luck with your "free speech" defense. Lucky for me... or should I say, the accused... that Stanley Kubrick's Killer's Kiss was playing on some movie channel.
The story follows a rapidly declining welterweight boxer who, for lack of any other life options, starts a humor website to help cash in on his dwindling fame... oh wait, that's the guy I work for![NOTE FROM THE CHIEF: That's enough with your God Damn cheapshots, dickhead!! - Tonto]
OK, all kidding aside, this fighter, a weenie named Davey Gordon, who might be the worst boxer in film history... which includes the first act montage of tomato cans that Rocky brutalizes in Rocky III, returns home to his dingy apartment from getting his ass KO'd in the first round of what could be his last shot at title fight (Holy Christ, this really could be the Tonto Balboa story) and sees his decently attractive blond neighbor, Gloria Price, getting roughed up by her criminal boyfriend.
It might just be me, but names don't get much more heavy handed than "Gloria Price," (glory, a price - do I have to hold your hand through this shit?) but hey, we're talking film noir, which is pretty heavy handed filmmaking genre, so I'll let this one pass.
Of course, Davey gets involved and he falls for Gloria, and she seems to like Davey enough to make out with and presumably nail (so much for this being a Tonto Balboa story), and the two plan to leave town (there's that "glory" - something pretty important to a spent fighter, right Tonto?)to a ranch ran by Davey's uncle up in Seattle. It was Kubrick's uncle who financed the film, so setting the fabled "finish line" of the story at an uncle's place is nice way to say "hey, thanks for the cash!"
Ah, but there's no film noir without the villian, in this case the evil Vincent, who runs a dance hall where Gloria works. He too loves this dame and won't stand for her skipping town with Davey (which leads to the "a price" that I was talking about). Of course, after an hour and change of build up, it all comes down to Davey and Vincent in a fight to the death set in a manequin warehouse, which draws some parallels to the mirror sequence from The Lady From Shanghai.
It becomes very clear that Davey has no business in the ring because he really struggles against an overweight, middle age man in a zoot suit. Plot, schmot, who gives a crap about that? This is an early Kubrick film, which is the only real reason to watch the film. There's better film noir out there, but you can see some of the forming of what would become hallmarks of Kubrick's films.
The film opens with a beautiful long shot of Davey from the floor in a train station where he decides to tell us his story in voiceover. The pacing of the film is slow and deliberate until it builds to the climax between Davey and Vincent. There's far too much voiceover in the film, but on a low budget you gotta do what you gotta do to get all that exposition across.
The most notable theme in development in Killer's Kiss is confinement. Davey, like Jack Torrence in the Overlook, like Joker in boot camp and Vietnam, like Dr. Harford at a sex party with yuppies, and so on, is trapped externally (in Davey's case by the New York street life) as much as he is internally.
Killer's Kiss is worth a watch if you're a film nerd, or need a break from trying to figure out how to talk your way out of a $100 fine.
2 stars for Killer's Kiss
5 stars for pulling off a First Amendment free speech defense!
- Vans McCoy was knocked out at a Dead Kennedys show in the early 80’s and has been a cultural expert ever since. He has spent time in several small bands over the years. He sang for The Magnificent Cox, played bass in Manson’s Ranchers, and was lead guitarist for Televised Execution. He’s spent 347 days in local jails throughout the country and is now gainfully employed managing a local video store.
NOTE: If you liked this article, visit our Film Article Archive, our funny as a flesh wound Ask A Pirate Archives, or our stupidly poignant Political Column Archive!!!
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