Contributing to this waltz of mayhem is Nancy Allen and Dennis Franz' in-your-face repartee, the Hardy Boys bond between Allen and Gordon, and moreover, Angie Dickinson's sublime portrayal of a middle-aged woman looking for that one good sexual release, only to be mocked horribly, then wasted by a sinister cross-dresser(!). Film and film culture exist within our bigger, even cosmic, politic, and it's fitting that DRESSED TO KILL - in the summer of 1980 - blended techno-phobia (Dickinson's dismissal of her son's computer named 'Peter' right before she goes out looking for some good extramarital sex), a p.o.'d transexual, and the spectre of killer STDs coming back to haunt, then kill the leading lady! Mind you this was all on the eve of the computer explosion while HIV was secretly spinning its lethal web in urban areas, and Reaganitis was everywhere.

One must mention the film's humor, dark and ofttimes adolescent as it is (with dialogue like "Don't make me be a bad girl" delivered by a cross-dresser). As Dickinson lolls about in the museum, cruising a handsome stranger straight out of an Armani ad circa 1980, she is confronted with a wallsized canvas of a gorilla, also lolling about and staring back at her. Then she scribbles "banana" on her list of Things to Do (ha!), and in three beats, she's winding her way back and forth through the museum on the tail of that cute phallic object wearing Armani! Moreover, we get to be cine-sadists as the music AND the stranger toy with her emotions (will she get picked up or just toyed with and humiliated?). Donnagio's music leads us through all of her hopes and fears as the Steadicam tracks her through room after room of paintings in search of Mr. Right. It's a wonderful, naughty sequence, with another wicked piece of lyrical business ready to follow when she finally makes it to her new lover's two-toned Manhattan budoir.

What's truly Hitchcockian is how DePalma places most of the villains in the garb of caretakers: psychiatrists and nurses morph into highly eroticized killing machines; cops have a view of human nature so jaundiced one wonders why they bother to save anyone; and matronly moms just want a good afternoon of sex between designer sheets. Amidst it all, only a stock-market savvy prostitute hanging out with an asexual techno-snoop (who weeps over his dead mother for, like, five minutes, max!!) can save the day! What a fitting comic, capsule of the Reagan-Era Spirit that was to come!

DRESSED TO KILL is a giddy, sinister, utterly delightful brew of cinematic hocus-pocus that never loses it magic, especially on widescreen. One wishes DePalma could hit this stride again. Follow-ups like BODY DOUBLE and RAISING CAIN are only echoes of this pop-trash masterwork. Crank up the soundtrack and enjoy these 90 minutes of gothic dementia.

And heed dePalma's wacky warning: Don't ever get in the way of anyone who wants their own pair of high heels; they might get medieval on you.


A great tribute to Psycho with a decidedly modern edge   September 8, 2000
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

The setting is Manhattan, 1980 - a time and place where anything (including your worst urban paranoid fantasy) seemed possible. Please don't read the spoilers contained in the reviews below - all you need to know is that this elegant, unconventional thriller follows the path of a bored, sexually frustrated housewife (a luminous Angie Dickinson) whose misadventures land her in a situation of deep peril. Also contains one of the best scores I've heard composed for a thriller. The film is screaming for a wide-screen DVD release.


DRESSED TO KILL...hitchcock would have been proud   September 4, 2000
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

after seeing DRESSED TO KILL only one word came to mind...WOW. this movie was a really great suspense thriller. nancy allen(who was married to the director at the time) looked great for once in her acting career. i loved depalmas usage of the split screen and THE ENDING WAS AMAZING. angie dickenson was great as the character of kate miller and her death scene and all that led up to it was highly entertaining. and dont forget about the music. it too was very well orchastrated. dressed to kill pays great homage to hitchcock. and i praise depalma for his attempt. 'PSYCHO', which a lot of critics say the film mirrors, was great but dressed to kill shines in its own light.


Many Say It's A "Psycho" Clone, But Hey...It's Still Good!   May 28, 2000
 3 out of 3 found this review helpful

Brian De Palma is a great director. I love "Carrie", "Snake Eyes", and this newly discovered gem, "Dressed to Kill". It is most definetly a tribute to Alfred Hitchcock and his masterpiece "Psycho". The plot and killer are very similar to it. Many criticize De Palma for this, but I think he did a pretty good job! The elevator scene is so incredibly creepy that it gives me chills just thinking about it. Bobbi is one of the most unique (and scariest) killers ever in movie history. This is not a slasher film, if that is what you are expecting. If you liked "Psycho", then you'll love this. And even if you didn't, there is still a strong chance you'll like this anyway...


Brian De Palma has crafted a classic suspense/thriller   May 25, 2000
 11 out of 13 found this review helpful

Brian De Palma is a director praised for his visual style and originality. Unfortunately, his style rarely has had the chance to mix with a great script (the major exception is The Untouchables). He's been on a slump recently, as he just came out with the critically drubbed Mission to Mars and the absolutely atrocious Snake Eyes. Though if one wants to see exactly how fine a director he is, you should check out his films in the 80's, which was definitely the time of his heyday. De Palma is particlarly good at crafting suspense, as I noticed when I watched Body Double, his last erotic thriller. That was a seriously underrated film and it made me want to watch some more of his suspense/thrillers. Dressed to Kill seem to have the most resemblance to Body Double so I chose to watch that film. Now, I didn't think Dressed to Kill could possibly match Body Double's suspense but to my surprise, Dressed to Kill is just as great a film, as it's suspense is, to some regard, even more unnerving.

The film begins surrealistically as we see a woman taking a shower. She runs her hands over body sensuously and the expression on her face is obviously one of pleasure. The score that runs in the background at the time is a pleasant one, but this sensuous bubble is burst when a man steps behind this woman, grabs her, and begins to rape her in the shower, and the scene makes a sudden change as we see a man having sex with the same woman on a bed. We find out the woman's name is Kate Miller (Angie Dickinson) and that she has marital troubles. She sees a psychiatrist named Dr. Elliott (Michael Caine) about these problems. In a session early in the film, she tells him that she no longer enjoys sex with her husband. Afterward, she goes to an art museum where she meets a man she feels attracted to. In true De Palma fashion, the camera pans around the entire museum as we see Kate playing a game of cat-and-mouse with this man. When Kate believes she's lost him, the man appears in a taxi, and Kate enters inside, to which they then have a sexual tryst inside. Later, she awakens inside his apartment, apparently having the spent the whole afternoon with this stranger. As she is putting her clothing back on (the stranger is asleep) she finds a health report inside a drawer stating that he has contracted a venereal disease. Shocked and scared, Kate leaves the apartment and heads for the elevator. In what is one of the film's most suspenseful and shocking sequences, Kate realizes she has left her wedding ring in the apartment and heads up through the elevator again. As the door opens, a blonde woman with a razor creeps in and slashes her to death. It's a shocking scene as the audience begins to believe that Kate is the film's protagonist, until she is killed just a half hour into the film. Her murder is witnessed by a prostitute named Liz Blake (Nancy Allen) and her life is now in obvious danger from this blonde woman known only as Bobbi. With the help of Kate's brilliant son Peter (Keith Gordon), Liz attempts to find the killer and her identity.

After a slow first 25 minutes, Dressed to Kill is filled with unbearable suspense for the next 75 minutes. The last 3 minutes of the film are particularly nerve wracking. There are so many great suspense sequences that work throughout the entire film, all the way from the elevator scene to a chase into the subway. Those scenes should give any viewer a good scare. It's certainly what one would describe as edge-of-your seat suspense. I know those sequences freaked me out, and those last few minutes in the film is a true heart-pounding nerve jangler. This is what De Palma is good at and he should make more films like this.

The film's acting is also quite good. The film's main protagonists, played by Nancy Allen and Keith Gordon, are likeable characters and there's a certain romantic tension that develops between them. The chemistry between both characters works well. Michael Caine also delivers a good performance as the psychiatrist who begins to suspece a patient of his as the murderer. Fun to watch is an early role for Dennis Franz as the detective on the case. Angie Dickinson, though only in the film for a short time, develops her character into a sympathetic one, despite her adulterous behavior.

From the plot description above, it may seem like the film has a lot of nudity, and in truth, there is. But it never gets too explicit and it's place in the film is appropriate and it works well. Is this an erotic thriller? Well, it is somewhat like one but it doesn't really rely on a lot of sex to maintain the viewer's attention (there's really only one sex scene in the movie) such as a movie like Basic Instinct. Instead, the film is more of a psychological thriller, as it relies more on suggestion than explicit detail to scare the viewer.

Is Dressed to Kill De Palma's best suspense/thriller? Well, it's at the very least as good as Body Double. Both films have certain similarities and similar tones. There are certain aspects that work better in one film than another. For one example, the sex and nudity in Body Double does get a little gratuitous and sleazy in the second half (There's even nudity in the closing credits) while it never gets that way in Dressed to Kill. Body Double has a more ominous and creepy musical score and a very interesting protagonist (that's not to say the protagonists of Dressed to Kill aren't interesting because they are). Double's plot twists are also extremely unpredictable while one of Dressed to Kill's twists becomes obvious at least half way through the film (though I didn't think that hurt the movie). But it's really not fair to compare those two. They're separate films and should be considered on what each has to offer.

I would very much highly recommend you watch both movies, definitely late at night and with no more than one other person.