Dressed To Kill

Arrow continue their reissuing of Brian De Palma's back catalogue - Obsession and Blow Out are already availabe, while The Fury lands in October - with a remastered blu ray release of Dressed to Kill.

While some of the soft focus, over-lit scenes may not necessarily lend themselves well to the blu ray treatment, De Palma's lurid extreme close-ups certainly benefit from the clarity and detail offered by the format. New York at night, shot on film, cannot help but look fantastic and inherently cinematic, with a car chase through the city providing the best example of this.

As for the extras, it's a fairly thorough offering although it must be noted that they can feel repetitious. This is more the fault of actors and producers who have a stock anecdote for any situation, and that one of the extras, The Making of A Thriller, precedes the others by a good few years, so we hear the cast and crew repeat the same stories in their individual interviews on the film.

That said, The Making of A Thriller and Slashing Dressed To Kill are the strongest of the extras on show here, as they offer the most access to Brian De Palma and his insights on the process of making the film. It is a little disappointing that there isn't more of De Palma in the extras.

Angie Dickinson, Keith Gordon and producer George Litto, however, do provide an impression of what it was like working with De Palma in his pomp. Dickinson, while clearly fond of the director, points out that he was not one to suffer fools gladly and was single-minded in his vision of how the film should look. Litto almost gushes with admiration for De Palma's talent, while Gordon has nothing but affection for the director who not only rewrote a part to cast him, but also took time to offer advice and guidance to the budding young filmmaker and actor.