Sark and Rick Discuss Brian De Palma's "Body Double"

This post is being republished as part of ClassicBecky's and Dorian's The Best Hitchcock Movies (That Hitchcock Never Made) blogathon. Click here to read other entries in the blogathon.

This discussion of Body Double (1984) between film fans from different generations assumes that you’ve seen the film. But if you haven’t—or have, but need a plot refresher--here’s a synopsis:

Actor Jake Scully (Craig Wasson) experiences a debilitating episode of claustrophobia on the set of a low-budget horror film. Dismissed for the day, he discovers his girlfriend Carol making love to another man. Later, he learns that he has been fired from the movie. Since Carol owned the house they shared, Jake needs to find new lodgings. His luck improves when another actor, Sam, offers a house-sitting gig. One of the perks of the observatory-like house is a telescope aimed at the window of an attractive woman who performs a provocative dance routine every night. Jake becomes obsessed with his "window" neighbor, but becomes concerned when he spies another man watching and following her. (Body Double is rated R for adult themes, nudity, and violence.)

Rick29: Sark, you once said that De Palma’s best Hitchcock homages were the ones where he took Hitchcockian themes and turned them on their head. I think Body Double is a great example of that. On the surface, Body Double is a suspense film--and a very good one. But underneath the surface, it's a witty film about acting and deception. When Jake freezes up while reliving the "sardine game" in his acting class, the teacher yells at him: "You've got to act!" That's just what everyone around Jake does throughout the rest of the movie. Alexander Revelle acts the role of Sam who, in turn, acts the role of "the Indian." Holly acts out of the role of Gloria. Even Jake gets in the game, acting out the role of an adult film producer. The scene over the closing credit is a perfect coda, where De Palma shows us a body double in a shower scene in the horror film. Holly, who is standing beside the lead actress, tells her: "I bet this will get you a lot of dates." Thus, more deception will be promulgated!

Sark: In keeping with the idea of deception in the form of acting, it's interesting that Jake's "real life" is the Hitchcockian world. His girlfriend betrays him, he's allowed to stay in an extravagant house, he spies on his beautiful neighbor and eventually shadows her. He's no longer on the movie set, but his life is a movie. And, as we learn, these occurrences in his life are for a "role" that's been scripted for him. And he still can't act, just like in his class. But when he moves beyond the "movie," he enters the adult film industry, and it seems more real than his life. That's because, in actuality, it is real, whereas he was previously being set up as the witness. But he's great as the producer. So he essentially steps off the movie set again. Only this time, he's making his own film, and doing a darn fine job of acting. It's funny that he tells Holly he's interested in her starring in one of his films. He's lying to her, but in another way, he's being truthful. She's in his movie, and I guess that would mean Jake is making a sequel to Sam's movie, right?

Rick29: Great point! And the climax to Jake's film is when he's trapped in the grave with Holly. And what does he do? He uses a method acting technique to overcome his claustrophobia. He remembers what it was like to be trapped--a "sardine"--in the grave in the movie set. Then, he uses that feeling as motivation to overcome his fear and get out of the real grave. By the way, I forgot to mention my favorite of De Palma's visual gags: The title of the movie is shown over a desert landscape. The camera begin to pan apparently, but it turns out that it's the desert that's moving--it's just a canvas backdrop being wheeled around a movie studio. Right from the start, De Palma lets us know that he's going to play with what's real and what's not.

Sark: De Palma is a stylist, and he's always toying with audience's perceptions. I think he manages to do this even with individual characters. It's important to distinguish Gloria from Holly. Gloria is in Sam's movie, the woman for whom he is intended to be a witness. When he finally speaks to her, she's illuminated with soft lighting, and her voice is of the breathless variety. She's a purely cinematic character. Jake's kiss with her is intensified by De Palma's revolving camera (which De Palma had done before in Obsession and Carrie almost as if he is mocking himself). Holly's introduction--her true introduction--is in a pornographic video, and when Jake finally meets her, he's in such a movie, too. Holly's wearing a leather outfit and is covered in harsh lighting (but still very pretty). She isn't a meek woman like Gloria, and with her rather colorful language, she's much more realistic, more true to life. Jake's kiss with Holly, while they're filming the aforementioned movie, is coupled with the previous kiss. It's really just De Palma saying that everything with Gloria isn't real. What's ironic is that Holly is a body double, a cinematic element, but she is the person who brings Jake into the real world. (And, of course, lest we forget that several years earlier, De Palma was criticized for using a body double for Angie Dickinson in her shower scene in Dressed to Kill.)

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