By Raymond Benson
The
Killing (directed by
Stanley Kubrick)
Cul-de-sac
(directed
by Roman Polanski)
From
The Criterion Collection on DVD and Blu-Ray
Examining
early pictures by directors who went on to bigger and better things is always a
fascinating exercise. In this case, the experience is both academically
rewarding and monumentally entertaining. They are a tremendous amount of fun to
watch, yet film aficionados will certainly study the pieces and place them in
perspective with the later, betterl-known masterpieces by these two iconic artists. Are there common thematic elements? Do we see glimpses of the later Stanley
Kubrick or Roman Polanski in these early efforts? Without a doubt, The Criterion Collection’s
new releases of The Killing and Cul-de-sac display the beginning of masterful
craftsmanship from two youthful filmmakers.
The Killing package is two
bangs for a buck—not only do you get a crisply clean, picture-perfect
remastered edition of The Killing,
but on a second disk you also get the same quality remastering of Kubrick’s
earlier independent film noir, Killer’s
Kiss. What a deal! I remember the first time I saw these movies;
there were a double bill at a New York revival house, so I’ll always think of
them as a pair.
Killer’s Kiss was Kubrick’s
second feature film, released by United Artists in 1955. Kubrick made it guerilla-style on the streets
of New York—he never had permits to film at city locations, so the director quickly
shot what he needed and then skedaddled. Kubrick directed it, produced it, wrote it, shot it, edited it, and did
the post-sync work. Then he went out and
marketed it himself and sold it to a distributor. That’s impressive independent filmmaking,
especially for the early 1950s, when indy productions were not what they became
in the seventies and beyond. As an
entertainment, Killer’s Kiss is unquestionably
B-movie material, but most film noirs are. The story is passable, but the picture is so well photographed that it
doesn’t matter. Watch for the surreal
fight amongst naked mannequins in the warehouse toward the movie’s climax—it’s
pure Kubrick.