Sketchin’ 47

Released way back in 1955 and directed by Robert Aldrich (perhaps best known for directing 1967’s The Dirty Dozen and the original 1974 Burt Reynolds starring The Longest Yard), Kiss Me Deadly is, to me, one of the most fascinating post-modern “noir” films ever made. It was WAY ahead of its time and skirted with what I’m sure were considerable censor issues, presenting us with a Mike Hammer we’d never seen before or since.

In this movie, Mike Hammer (played by Ralph Meeker) was a smiling shark, a sleazy, blinged out P.I. who made a living off of equally sleazy divorce cases. Once hired by a disgruntled wife, he’d set his faithful and sexy secretary Velda (Maxine Cooper, terrific in her role and accompanying Mr. Meeker in the picture below) off to seduce the soon to be divorced men while Hammer takes photographs of the whole thing.  Here they are, the sleazy P.I. and his faithful girl Friday…

In the movie, Hammer’s living is good enough for him to dress well and have a very modern -for the time- apartment while driving around in an exotic car. But Hammer is after a bigger score, and when he gets involved in a case of some stolen …something… that has the government, local police, and the mob all excited, he senses he’s about to make himself the biggest score of all.

And when Lt. Pat Murphy, who has absolutely zero tolerance for this creep, tells him he’s in “way over his head”, Hammer should have listened to the man’s warning.

If you haven’t seen the film and this sounds like your cup of tea, by all means go out there and get it. It was recently released by Criterion films on BluRay and is very much worth checking out. A bit of trivia: Remember the glowing suitcase in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction? That idea was taken directly from this movie.