Body Double
1984 Directed by Brian De Palma
With Netflix giving a smattering of 1984 films I figured I'd focus on the one that really pulled my attention from the other offerings. Yes Amadeus is an amazing film- but I'm doubtful to the curation aspect when so many classic films are left out (Ghostbusters, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Romancing the Stone, Star Trek 3, The Terminator, Dune, etc.). De Palma's Body Double is an eccentric film- manifesting the dark social context of the 1980s with a jilted satire of Hollywood.
There are clear callbacks to Hitchcock's cinematography - the voyeur becoming participant. The viewer demanding exploitation- Craig Wasson plays an actor, Jack Scully, whose method acting seems to prey upon his own trauma. His aimlessness leads him to an apartment overlooking a would be damsel in distress. This reworking of Rear Window also plays on how Hollywood tends to see villains through physical disease or racial caricature. The actor becomes obsessive with this woman, and is unable to stop her murder. De Palma frames the murder itself in a ludicrous fashion - with a large phallic drill. The idea of it is more violent than the actual visuals, but it sets the actor on a journey to being framed. His journey leads to the underbelly of the pornographic business, and that's where the film really picks up momentum with Melanie Griffith's portrayal of Holly Body.
The film enters into a dream state here- with a full on rendition of "Relax" with Frankie Goes to Hollywood as a music video within movie- a realization of Jack's pent up sexuality and release. The set piece and grand affair of hedonism is a wonderful musical fantasia that tips the unreal state of what we’re watching.
What was Jack really seeing that night in the window. Is everything that we're perceiving reality or merely a performance that we're greedily needing as voyeurs? Is anything Hollywood produces and self aggrandizes any better than a circle jerk? At least pornography knows what its audience wants. This is De Palma chewing through the critique of art and what is considered cinema- of the revered Hitchcock to his pornographic Scarface. De Palma is accepting his audience. Often we look at violence within film at different levels. But is the violence of exploitation cinema like Scarface really different than that of something like Godfather?
The finale and reveal of the baddie is pretty obvious- in part because of the awareness of the casting for the villain, but also because the makeup of the villain is so over the top obvious that it seems by design that the falseness of what is going on is forefront to the tone of the film. This is also interesting because Body Double is the videotape that Patrick Bateman constantly rents in the book version of American Psycho. That overlay of reality distortion in the 1980s adds to themes of both films.
As an epilogue Jack Scully finally overcomes his fears- able to go through his B-movie vampire role in the fake movie "Vampire's Kiss." Nicolas Cage would go on to create a heightened portrayal in the real version of that film so it's funny how the world of Hollywood reflects on itself. Though the general tension doesn't flow as well as some of De Palma's other films, Body Double really works on how the viewer takes in the world of film.