Body Double (1984)

 ☆ ☆ ☆

Body Double (1984) – B. De Palma

Brian De Palma’s obsession with Hitchcock reaches its logical conclusion in this extremely lurid pastiche of both Rear Window and Vertigo. Whereas Hitch managed to get us to identify with Jimmy Stewart’s “Scottie” (Vertigo) and “Jeff” (Rear Window) despite their unsavoury behaviours, De Palma makes these problems more explicit so that Craig Wasson’s Jake is more obviously a peeping tom and a stalker. Thus, even as we come to suspect that Jake is a pawn in somebody else’s plot (a la Vertigo), being encouraged to witness a murder and to draw the wrong conclusions, we can’t really feel as much sympathy for him. Sure, his weakness (claustrophobia in this case) makes him the perfect dupe but De Palma lets Jake cross so many conceivable lines of propriety (um, even becoming a porn star?) that the plot mechanics borrowed from the Master lose some of their effect in the trashiness of it all.  De Palma does a good job with the camera, using tracking shots to elicit a dream-like state as Jake trails Gloria around Hollywood (including stealing the 360 degree kiss from Vertigo), but Wasson is a bland everyman who seems to have never been relied on to carry another film after this. In contrast, Melanie Griffith does show a spark of charisma (in the final minutes of the film), despite being objectified for most of the film. Truly, De Palma’s films always seem to go too far in the direction of bad taste but Body Double is ultimately less enjoyable than Blow Out, Sisters, Obsession, and even Dressed to Kill (if I am remembering them correctly). I did not remember the music video for Frankie Goes to Hollywood embedded in the film but I did see them in concert around this time!