The Ultimate Time Capsule.
We closed out August with a look at the horror elements in the non-horror film Shiva Baby, the trans empowerment of Sleepaway Camp 2: Unhappy Campers, and Park Chan-wook’s English-language debut Stoker. Now, our first episode of September kicks off a month themed after one of Joe’s favorite sub-genres: the erotic thriller!
First up is Brian De Palma‘s controversial masterpiece Dressed to Kill.
Dressed to Kill sees high-priced sex worker Liz Blake (Nancy Allen) witness a mysterious woman brutally slay homemaker Kate Miller (Angie Dickinson). The police think Liz is the murderer and the real killer wants to silence the crime’s only witness, putting Liz in a tough situation. Only Kate’s inventor son, Peter (Keith Gordon), believes Liz. Peter and Liz team up to find the real culprit, who has an unexpected means of hiding her identity and an even more surprising motivation to kill.
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Episode 246: Dressed to Kill (1980)
Grab your blonde wig, sunglasses and straight razor because we’re kicking off a month of erotic thrillers with the grandaddy of them all: Brian De Palma’s 1980 masterpiece Dressed to Kill! Joining us for the conversation is Austin-based queer film historian Elizabeth Purchell!
Join us as we trace the film’s journey from the mind of De Palma to a protested and picketed controversy among feminists and members of the queer community. It’s a film that’s all style and some substance, but we’d be remiss if we didn’t tackle the film’s more divisive aspects.
Plus: “beaver shots,” plenty of gay porn discussions, racist stereotypes, and the film’s connections to Cruising.
Cross out Dressed to Kill!
Coming up on Wednesday: We’re continuing or month of erotic thrillers with a more recent (and slightly off-kilter) pick in Paul Feig’s incest-laden suburban noir A Simple Favor.
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for nearly 260 hours of additional content! This month we’re discussing A Haunting in Venice, The Nun 2, and we will also have two audio commentaries: one on Underworld and one on Saw II. Oh, and we’ll also have an extra special episode on 2021’s The Voyeurs to coincide with this month’s main feed theme of erotic thrillers.
