Movie · 1980 · Thriller, Mystery, Horror · 1h 45m · R · English
Curator score: 6.8/10 (56.6K ratings)
The latest fashion in murder.
Overview
After witnessing a mysterious woman brutally slay a homemaker, prostitute Liz Blake finds herself trapped in a dangerous situation. While the police thinks she is the murderer, the real killer is intent on silencing her only witness.
Ratings
Curator score: 6.8/10
IMDb: 7.0/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 83%
Metacritic: 74
TMDB: 7.0/10
Director
Brian De Palma
Production
Filmways Pictures, Cinema 77 Films
Cast
Michael Caine, Nancy Allen, Angie Dickinson, Keith Gordon, Dennis Franz, David Margulies, Ken Baker, Susanna Clemm, Brandon Maggart, Amalie Collier, Mary Davenport, Anneka Di Lorenzo, Norman Evans, Robbie L. McDermott, Bill Randolph, Sean O'Rinn, Fred Weber, Samm-Art Williams, Robert Lee Rush, Anthony Boyd Scriven
Curator Review
Verdict
A glossy, suspenseful De Palma thriller that blends erotic charge, murder mystery mechanics, and bravura visual set pieces. It’s stylish, tense, and memorable, but its infamous twist and dated gender politics can be a major hurdle.
Best for
fans of Hitchcock-inspired thrillers
viewers who like sleek 1980s genre cinema
audiences drawn to stylized suspense and set-piece direction
people interested in controversial cult classics
Skip if
you want progressive or unproblematic representation
you dislike sexualized thriller aesthetics
you prefer straightforward mysteries over twisty, heightened melodrama
you’re not in the mood for 1980s sleaze and camp
Overview
Dressed to Kill is Brian De Palma at his most controlled and most shameless: a movie built from mirrors, glances, fetishized surfaces, and elaborate suspense machinery. It borrows heavily from Hitchcock, but pushes the material into a more lurid, erotic, and self-consciously sensational register, with a museum sequence and elevator attack that remain among the film’s most effective set pieces.
Worth noting
The film’s pleasures are obvious if you respond to formal bravado: the camera movement is precise, the editing is sharp, and the atmosphere is thick with danger and desire. Angie Dickinson gives the movie emotional weight, Nancy Allen is a strong presence as the trapped witness, and Michael Caine anchors the psycho-sexual intrigue with a chilly, unsettling performance.
Bottom line
At the same time, the film is inseparable from its controversies. Its treatment of gender and identity is dated and often ugly, and the ending leaves a sour aftertaste for many viewers. If you can separate craft from ideology, it’s a striking, influential thriller; if you can’t, the movie’s provocations may overwhelm its virtues.
Top Letterboxd reviews
Will Menaker (4★) · 3260 likes
My favorite part of this movie is that Michael Caine's therapist character is repeatedly propositioned for sex by his female clients who all ask him "don't you want to fuck me doc?" and his response is always "absolutely!"
CinemaVoid 🏴☠️ (4★) · 2534 likes
A hooker and a geek join forces to end transphobia once and for all but they only make it worse.
Patrick Willems (4★) · 1874 likes
What if Psycho but way more perverted and problematic? Love it.
Sally Jane Black · 1462 likes
If you've been following along, you can probably guess what I hated about this. De Palma's style is great. He's got this slick, noirish feel that makes good use of shadow and reflection and odd angles to drive the intensity of any given scene, but almost right away, I predicted his big twist. And, of course, the twist left a sour taste in my mouth. All the Hitchcockian references, all the gloriously bloody murders, all the weird inventions by the… more If you've been following along, you can probably guess what I hated about this. De Palma's style is great. He's got this slick, noirish feel that makes good use of shadow and reflection and odd angles to drive the intensity of any given scene, but almost right away, I predicted his big twist. And, of course, the twist left a sour taste in my mouth. All the Hitchcockian references, all the gloriously bloody murders, all the weird inventions by the… more
Ella Kemp (2.5★) · 1380 likes
Ooohhhh my name is Brian De Palma did you know I know what a split diopter is