Blow Out
Director: Brian De Palma
Year Released: 1981
Rating: 2.5
De Palma's constant references to classic cinema seem to me less creative and more distracting, their inclusion taking me out of the movie and getting me thinking about where it came from (Hitchcock, Antonioni, Coppola's The Conversation – which in itself is an homage to Blow Up – as well as the Bond pictures, Halloween, Psycho, his own Dressed to Kill, etc.). His movies are basically collages - like Cornell's boxes in the art world – collecting disparate pieces from all around him and including them in his little self-contained film nerd universe. It doesn't work as a whole, but the craft is certainly there and there are some genuine moments of suspense. Nancy Allen's performance is irritating but it has to be on purpose, considering that most of the actresses in De Palma's pictures never seem to be more than unintelligent victims.
