Tommy Udo (Richard Windmark) is not only a killer, he’s a thief, and he steals the show. He’s the best part of the Kiss of Death, even when he’s only there for fifteen minutes.
The film grows on you as the story goes along. There are some wonderful moments, including the docu-noir style, the use of sound, and the
I personally like that it’s narrated by a woman, Nettie (Coleen Gray), but the narration and story is a little bit moralistic and off-putting. But the worst part of Kiss of Death is having a babysitter who has been in love with the dad since she was a little girl. I guess it was a different time, but was it necessary?
I find Kiss of Death more like a 4.5-star film, but I’ll give it a 5, lest Udo comes back from the death to throw me down the stairs.
Because of several cuts on the insistence of the censors and the voice over at the end, which attempts to lighten the darkness, this just falls short of perfection. However, it is still pretty damn close.
Featuring the film debut of — and a tour de force, Oscar-nominated performance by — film noir fan favorite Richard Widmark as giggling psychopath Tommy Udo, Henry Hathaway’s Kiss of Death contrasts the brutality and bitterness of noir (“I’m the kind of guy you can’t hurt”) with the safety and pathos of postwar family life, demonstrating that the contradictions of human nature can also make for gripping entertainment. Gangster Udo goes from prison pal to deadly nemesis for Nick Bianco (Victor Mature), an ex-con who’s offered early parole by assistant district attorney Louis D’Angelo (Brian Donlevy) if he’ll get in tight with Udo and his accomplices and keep law enforcement informed of the gang’s plans. Nick had resisted D’Angelo’s offer for years, that is until babysitter Nettie (Coleen Gray, also in her film debut) visits the prison to inform Nick that his wife has committed suicide and his two little daughters have been sent to an orphanage. While Nick cooperates with the DA’s office and ultimately testifies against Udo, he marries Nettie and experiences a period of domestic tranquility with his girls in Astoria, Queens, but all comes crashing down when Udo’s trial takes an unexpected turn (“Know what I do to squealers?” Udo says at one point. “I let them have it right in the belly so they can roll around thinking it over”). Using plenty of location shooting (Art Deco buildings, train stations, Queens neighborhoods), Hathaway builds extraordinary tension as the film proceeds, intensifying in the third act as Nick awaits an inevitable confrontation; Hathaway pairs low-key cinematography with long periods of silence to heighten suspense, such as when Nick hears a sound during the night or when Udo slowly emerges from between curtains. Don’t miss the iconic scene when Udo tosses a wheelchair down the stairs, not bothering to remove its elderly occupant first.
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