The Naked Kiss (Criterion/eOne, 1963) D: Sam Fuller, w/ Constance Towers, Anthony Eisley. Rating: NNNNN DVD package: NNNNN Rating: NNNNN
Samuel Fuller is one of America’s most creative, courageous and influential directors. These are two of his best.
In Shock Corridor, an arrogant reporter has himself committed to an asylum in the hope of solving a murder. The Naked Kiss features a prostitute who goes to a new town in search of a new life. She finds a loving fiancé and a job working with kids, but hypocrisy and sleaze intervene.
Fuller uses these noirish melodramas as blunt indictments of what he calls the American lie: attitudes around race, sex and nuclear terror in Shock Corridor hypocrisy in The Naked Kiss. They were radical in their day and still pack a considerable punch.
Fuller goes for emotional realism, but he’d been a reporter and kept his absolute commitment to story and a direct, journalistic style. The result is propulsive movies that keep the action in your face and carry an ever-present threat of impending violence.
Both movies come with the Criterion label’s usual high-quality extras with thoughtful analysis and lots of onscreen Fuller. The best of them is Shock Corridor’s hour-long doc.
EXTRAS Corridor: Towers interview, Fuller doc, essay booklet. Kiss: Towers interview, three TV Fuller interviews, essay booklet. Both films widescreen, b&w English audio and subtitles.
