Kiss Me Deadly Summary
MPAA Rating: NR
Director: Robert Aldrich
Genres: Thriller
Rating:
Regarded by many critics as the ultimate film noir, and by many more as the finest movie adaptation of a book by Mickey_Spillane, Kiss Me Deadly stars Ralph_Meeker as Spillane's anti-social private eye Mike Hammer. While driving down a lonely road late one evening, Hammer picks up a beautiful blonde hitchhiker (Cloris_Leachman), dressed in nothing but a raincoat. At first, Hammer assumes that the incoherent girl is an escaped lunatic; his mind is changed for him when he and the girl are abducted by two thugs. The men torture the girl to death as the semiconscious Hammer watches helplessly. He himself escapes extermination when the murderers' car topples off a cliff and he is thrown clear. Seeking vengeance, Hammer tries to discover the secret behind the girl's murder. Among those who cross his path in the film's tense, tingling 105 minutes are a slimy gangster (Paul_Stewart), a turncoat scientist (Albert_Dekker), and the dead woman's sexy roommate (Gaby_Rodgers). All clues lead to a mysterious box -- the "Great Whatsit," as Hammer's secretary Velda (Maxine_Cooper) describes it. Both the box and Velda are stolen by the villains, at which point Hammer discovers that the "Whatsit" contains radioactive material of awesome powers. The apocalyptic climax is doubly devastating because we're never quite certain if Hammer survives (he doesn't narrate the story, as was the case in most Mike Hammer films and TV shows). Director Robert_Aldrich and scriptwriter Jack_Moffit transcend Kiss Me Deadly's basic genre trappings to produce a one-of-a-kind melodrama for the nuclear age. Hal Erickson, Rovi
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