A Kiss Before Dying
Directed by Gerd Oswald
Written by Lawrence Roman from a novel by Ira Levin
1956/USA
Crown Productions
First viewing/Amazon Instant
[box] Bud Corliss: Haven’t you heard? Love conquers all.[/box]
This movie is OK but not nearly as good as I remember the novel being.
Bud Corliss (Robert Wagner) is a 25-year-old college student. He has been dating Dori Kingship (Joanne Woodward), the daughter of a mining tycoon. They have kept the relationship secret from her very controlling father. Now she is pregnant. She breaks the news to Bud, who is not pleased to say the least. He had been looking forward to marrying the mining fortune and knows that Dori will be thrown out of the family if her father learns of her indiscretion. Dori doesn’t care about the money or anything really except Bud. He puts off their wedding in hopes “there will be some change”. There is none and he starts making other plans.
It is not fair to go further into the plot which relies on a couple of surprises. With Mary Astor as Bud’s mother and George Macready as Dori’s father.
I don’t think much of Robert Wagner as an actor but I must say he is perfect for his character. Joanne Woodward is always great. I felt like a fool because I kept looking at her thinking “that looks exactly like Joanne Woodward”! Then of course it was, I thought she was going to show up in a different part. There’s a lot of Hitchcockian touches and jump cuts in this. To me it illustrated what a difference the finesse of a master’s hand made in Hitchcock’s films. They came off as slightly clunky in this one.
Trailer
