Body DoubleThey say that imitation is the most sincere form of flattery. Apt, because Brian De Palma's Body Double is a big, sloppy wet kiss to some of the best films by the "Master of Suspense", Alfred Hitchcock. It is the story of a struggling actor named Jake Scully (Craig Wasson), who is in need of lodging after finding his wife, Carol (Barbara Crampton), in bed with another man. Someone who is nice to him called Sam Bouchard (Gregg Henry) sympathizes and lets him take over a house-watching gig at a very modern, UFO-shaped bungalow in the Hollywood Hills. (It's a real structure called the "Chemosphere".) Sam invites Jake to peep on an attractive neighbor--later revealed to be Gloria Revelle (Deborah Shelton)--through a telescope, an act that draws Jake ever deeper into a spiral of conspiracy and eroticism.
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It's no mystery that De Palma's films have been inspired by Hitchcock, but it's never been so deliberate as it is in Body Double. Numerous shots and motifs are pulled clearly from classics, ranging from Vertigo, Psycho, and Dial M for Murder, to others like Spellbound and Rear Window. (You name it!) So much of the joy in watching Body Double comes from being informed of these references in advance. Without that background, much of this movie seems outright bizarre. (Not that it doesn't at times, anyway.) This is both a blessing and a curse for the movie. One of the richest experiences to come out of this is in the way that De Palma approaches what auteurs like Hitchcock have described as "pure cinema". In short, this is the idea that a story can be communicated without dialogue, but by music and imagery instead. There are numerous moments where Body Double excels at this, such as when Jake has taken it upon himself to follow Gloria to a mall and then to a beach house. Every aspect of the staging of these scenes is calculated (with special attention given to the beach scene), and is constantly informing the audience of the tension and anxiety that Jake feels, born from an unusual mixture of concern and arousal for Gloria. Despite the fast pace of Body Double, it isn't really until Jake is invited to peep at Gloria--who dances alone in front of her window while barely dressed, among other salacious acts--that the dialogue pauses and Jake simply observes. Many of these scenes are filled with big and emotional music by Pino Donaggio, an underappreciated composer who has worked with De Palma previously. The score is as much of a character as Jake, Gloria, and so on, often present and specifically catered to compliment Wasson's nuanced performance and how he conveys his inner thoughts through his facial expressions. What's interesting, however, is that despite these subtleties, Body Double is far from a subtle film. You can see De Palma's signature style all over Body Double, including call backs to his prior works. When we first see Jake, he is on a movie set in costume as a leather-clad vampire in his grave, resembling "Beef", the glam rocker from De Palma's Phantom of the Paradise. Similarly, Body Double is replete with scenes that depict the movie-making process itself (even if it is a caricature of it), resembling his earlier film, Blow Out. And of course, there's always the "alluring blonde"--a direct nod to Vertigo, yes, but also a trope De Palma has made his own. In prior De Palma films, this role was typically performed by Nancy Allen, but in Body Double, it falls to Melanie Griffith, who plays an adult film actress named "Holly Body". And if you're already starting to draw conclusions about Holly's last name against the title of the film, that should come as no surprise, as De Palma loves his wordplay and double meanings.
Logic must take a back seat in one's enjoyment of Body Double, and yet this does not mean to suggest that the audience should be ignorant of the sources of its inspiration, which have been blown up to a heightened degree. So many moments in the plot will undoubtedly raise questions, and there are a few inconsistencies in the plot (which in the interest of avoiding spoilers, I'll be vague about when discussing). On the contrary, there are sly and slick directorial tricks that are very cognizant of where the audience's eye travels to during the film--aspects that don't become evident until later, giving the audience that great "eureka" moment. And yet, regrettably, Body Double occasionally feels predisposed to "explaining" why something happened the way it did, largely by way of Jake talking to another character--a copout intended to actually explain away something potentially confusing to the audience. (Perhaps this, too, is a nod to the infamous denouement to Psycho.) I found that this was borderline insulting, especially for a movie that altogether expects a measure of attention from an attentive and thoughtful audience to piece together the puzzle for themselves. Jake's bizarre behavior largely stems from De Palma's almost painful adherence to recreating key shots and aspects of Hitch's oeuvre. The most excessive example of this comes after Jake has finally approached the woman he's been ogling from afar for the first time, then racing off to reclaim her stolen purse from the man--an "Indian"--who's been following her all along. Collapsing in a not-too-narrow tunnel while chasing him--apparently owing to his claustrophobia, which must be so extreme and sudden that even a tunnel affects him--Jakes act of heroism makes him as helpless as a kitten. After Gloria comes to his aid and helps him out of the tunnel, he seems about to explain him rationale for stalking her. Instead, he embraces her with a passion which she, shockingly, reciprocates (to a point). Her blouse starts peeling away from her, and both of them moan in ecstasy as the camera spins and spins around them--a deliberate effort to exceed the dizzying vertigo from the film of the same name and the same kiss between that film's main characters. This is far from the first homage, and will be far from the last; but it is the most direct one to be lifted from Hitchcock. That isn't to say that Body Double is merely a slap-dash collection of Hitchcock's greatest hits, but it's crucial to see the references for what they are to make any sense from them, and more importantly to see how the film is framed around this. At its best, Body Double evokes that same sense of suspense and tension from the films it admires, but at its worst, it gives over to excess and outlandishness. For example, once Jake magically concludes Holly's involvement in the plot, he takes it upon himself to audition for an adult movie to meet her, leading to a protracted (and frankly, exasperating) musical number with Frankie Goes to Hollywood performing their hit, "Relax", in a theatrical interpretation of the dirty movie's backstage. Other moments feel like they are nods to the vivid giallo horror films of the era by other Hitchcock admirers--like Dario Argento's Suspiria by way of the ridiculous drill the Indian wields at the mid-movie climax, or perhaps more directly to Abel Ferrara's The Driller Killer--creating a terrifying nightmare scenario, albeit one that results in an inconsistent second-half for the film. It's not so much that Body Double loses steam after that mid-movie climax, but that it makes a lot of suppositions about Jake alluded to (i.e. he's a pervert) by others--like Detective Jim McLean (Guy Boyd)--which it never adequately reinforces. Unfortunately, this could be a result of Body Double failing to make Jake into a genuine character in his own right, rather than just a pastiche of the protagonists from the movies by Alfred Hitchcock.
Recommended for: Fans of an erotic thriller that wears its inspiration visibly on its sleeve. At the very least, Body Double is a bold and brash, stylized thriller that is defiantly itself...even if being "itself" means standing on the shoulders of giants.
Logic must take a back seat in one's enjoyment of Body Double, and yet this does not mean to suggest that the audience should be ignorant of the sources of its inspiration, which have been blown up to a heightened degree. So many moments in the plot will undoubtedly raise questions, and there are a few inconsistencies in the plot (which in the interest of avoiding spoilers, I'll be vague about when discussing). On the contrary, there are sly and slick directorial tricks that are very cognizant of where the audience's eye travels to during the film--aspects that don't become evident until later, giving the audience that great "eureka" moment. And yet, regrettably, Body Double occasionally feels predisposed to "explaining" why something happened the way it did, largely by way of Jake talking to another character--a copout intended to actually explain away something potentially confusing to the audience. (Perhaps this, too, is a nod to the infamous denouement to Psycho.) I found that this was borderline insulting, especially for a movie that altogether expects a measure of attention from an attentive and thoughtful audience to piece together the puzzle for themselves. Jake's bizarre behavior largely stems from De Palma's almost painful adherence to recreating key shots and aspects of Hitch's oeuvre. The most excessive example of this comes after Jake has finally approached the woman he's been ogling from afar for the first time, then racing off to reclaim her stolen purse from the man--an "Indian"--who's been following her all along. Collapsing in a not-too-narrow tunnel while chasing him--apparently owing to his claustrophobia, which must be so extreme and sudden that even a tunnel affects him--Jakes act of heroism makes him as helpless as a kitten. After Gloria comes to his aid and helps him out of the tunnel, he seems about to explain him rationale for stalking her. Instead, he embraces her with a passion which she, shockingly, reciprocates (to a point). Her blouse starts peeling away from her, and both of them moan in ecstasy as the camera spins and spins around them--a deliberate effort to exceed the dizzying vertigo from the film of the same name and the same kiss between that film's main characters. This is far from the first homage, and will be far from the last; but it is the most direct one to be lifted from Hitchcock. That isn't to say that Body Double is merely a slap-dash collection of Hitchcock's greatest hits, but it's crucial to see the references for what they are to make any sense from them, and more importantly to see how the film is framed around this. At its best, Body Double evokes that same sense of suspense and tension from the films it admires, but at its worst, it gives over to excess and outlandishness. For example, once Jake magically concludes Holly's involvement in the plot, he takes it upon himself to audition for an adult movie to meet her, leading to a protracted (and frankly, exasperating) musical number with Frankie Goes to Hollywood performing their hit, "Relax", in a theatrical interpretation of the dirty movie's backstage. Other moments feel like they are nods to the vivid giallo horror films of the era by other Hitchcock admirers--like Dario Argento's Suspiria by way of the ridiculous drill the Indian wields at the mid-movie climax, or perhaps more directly to Abel Ferrara's The Driller Killer--creating a terrifying nightmare scenario, albeit one that results in an inconsistent second-half for the film. It's not so much that Body Double loses steam after that mid-movie climax, but that it makes a lot of suppositions about Jake alluded to (i.e. he's a pervert) by others--like Detective Jim McLean (Guy Boyd)--which it never adequately reinforces. Unfortunately, this could be a result of Body Double failing to make Jake into a genuine character in his own right, rather than just a pastiche of the protagonists from the movies by Alfred Hitchcock.
Recommended for: Fans of an erotic thriller that wears its inspiration visibly on its sleeve. At the very least, Body Double is a bold and brash, stylized thriller that is defiantly itself...even if being "itself" means standing on the shoulders of giants.