Kiss Me Deadly

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KISS ME DEADLY (1955)


In 1955, fully aware classic film noir
fucks itself for the final time.

In the first scene a woman running barefoot, crying
gasping for air contains the key, literally,
as the credits roll up from the wrong end of the screen.

Soon she is tortured, she screams and screams
but we see
only her knees.

Sound betrays image, the image
of the big wisecracking man is shorn and shorn again
by Woman--who sweats, lies, dances, opines--
Woman is more than hole

in this film it's the men that are only parts
lusting after the "great whatsit"
a/k/a Pandora's box. When it's opened--

hide in the ocean!--
from the apocryphal climax of so much sleazy
over-the-top bizarre dreaminess.

Perhaps Hammer really died in the opening sequence?

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