"DE PALMA CAN SEE THE STORY SO WELL THAT I THINK, LIKE A GREAT JAZZ ARTIST, HE LIKES TO RIFF"
Yesterday, No Film School posted an article written by Jason Hellerman, with the headline, "Brian De Palma's Pastiche Is Highly Underrated for Its Originality" - here's an excerpt:
When some people brush De Palma aside, they usually cite his reliance on other movies to make some of his magnum opuses. Yes, it's easy to see De Palma riffing on Hitchcock. Dressed to Kill takes sequences from Psycho and liberally borrows plot beats. Body Double takes the plot from Rear Window and adds in some Vertigo as well.He borrows the title of Michelangelo Antonioni's Blowup and the plot of Coppola's The Conversation for Blow Out. And The Untouchables' finale is a clear homage to the Odessa Steps sequence in Sergei Eisenstein's The Battleship Potemkin.
Because he does this, many people have labeled him as "unoriginal." That's not remotely the case. De Palma can see the story so well that I think, like a great jazz artist, he likes to riff. While we laud people like Quentin Tarantino for doing this, I think we need to remember that De Palma was a pioneer. He studied classical Hollywood and found the parts he thought he could update.
Posted by Geoff
at 10:09 PM CDT
Updated: Saturday, August 13, 2022 2:41 PM CDT
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Updated: Saturday, August 13, 2022 2:41 PM CDT
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