body double movie review

Cinephilia & Beyond - Films and Filmmaking

Brian De Palma’s ‘Body Double’: A Hitchcockian Thriller Executed in Completely Original Style

In Body Double , his 1984 erotic thriller that the critics were much too quick to judge and discard, Brian De Palma succeeded in creating an unforgettable film that at the same time pays an obvious tribute to the works of Alfred Hitchcock and remains somehow completely his own, coherent with his very own stylistic preferences and vision of filmmaking. This Hitchcockian thriller introduces us to a struggling actor, played perfectly by Craig Wasson, an expressionless, wooden average Joe neck-deep in a horrific, extraordinary situation. A combination of Vertigo , as our hero suffers from claustrophobia and is manipulated with by a scheming murderer, and Rear Window , as he enjoys the sight of his striptease-dancing neighbor through a telescope, De Palma’s movie plays with similar motifs and themes, presenting an unmistakable homage to Tinseltown’s film production of the forties. Moreover, Body Double paves the way for another cult classic that would confound us in the years that followed—Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights . In this wonderfully stylized mixture of sex, pornography, voyeurism, gore and overwhelming suspense, in which he makes the audience totally immersed in the bulletproof story and the occasionally overtly creepy atmosphere with the generous help of his main character, shaped into a helpless pawn we can so easily project ourselves onto, Brian De Palma offers us one of the most distinguishable pictures of the decade.

Written by Robert J. Avrech and De Palma himself, shot by cinematographer Stephen H. Burum , decorated with the titillating and erotic tunes of the filmmaker’s longtime cinematic companion Giuseppe ‘Pino’ Donaggio and delivering most likely the most impressive performance of Melanie Griffith ever recorded, Body Double was hardly greeted enthusiastically at the box office or especially from the critic’s couches. Roger Ebert was one of the few who wrote a favorable review. Once again ahead of his time and wise enough to look beyond current trends, he called this “cleverly constructed” film “an exhilarating exercise in pure filmmaking.” Since 1984, the perspective changed and Body Double got the recognition that eluded it upon release. William Friedkin recently stated that movies are usually made for a contemporary audience, suggesting that later praise doesn’t fully mend the wounds of old financial misfortunes, but it must be heartwarming for De Palma to see to what degree his picture’s reputation grew.

More than a few film lovers and analytics point to the fact that the film could be also seen as the director’s sharp response to his critics, who relentlessly attacked his work as blood-and-nudity-drenched indulgencies to his artistically cheap inner compulsions. It’s almost as if De Palma collected all of the harshest reviews and, based upon their ill-devised points, created the ultimate come back, the cinematic embodiment of all things that drive him as an artist. And an artist he truly is, as even the seemingly cheapest shots are made for a specific, artistically justified point. Remaining true to his style, De Palma produced one of the finest thrillers around.

A monumentally important screenplay. Dear every screenwriter/filmmaker, read Robert J. Avrech & Brian De Palma’s screenplay for Body Double [ PDF ]. (NOTE: For educational and research purposes only ). The DVD/Blu-ray of the film is available at Amazon and other online retailers. Absolutely our highest recommendation: Carlotta’s Ultra Collector’s Box .

An interview with Robert Avrech, screenwriter of Brian De Palma’s Body Double . Avrech discussed working with De Palma, and the screenplay he wrote about the Yom Kippur War that led to De Palma hiring him for Body Double : “Brian De Palma came to me with a very general idea for Body Double . I immediately responded to its Hitchcockian theme of an innocent man drawn into a murder by a beautiful woman (Deborah Shelton), who then sets out to solve the mystery with the aid of a beautiful blonde (Melanie Griffith). Both Brian and I were, and are, huge fans of Alfred Hitchcock’s movies. Together we screened Rear Window and Vertigo , and discussed the narrative strategies Hitch used in both films. So in a sense, I was working off of De Palma’s ideas of Hitchcock’s ideas.” — Behind the Scenes with Hollywood Screenwriter, Robert Avrech

Brian De Palma is grouped with the so-called movie brats—filmmakers who learned their craft in the ’60s and flourished in the ’70s and ’80s. Critics speak with admiration of Lucas’ adventurers, Scorsese’s losers, Spielberg’s kids and Coppola’s families. De Palma has staked out more controversial terrain: suspense, violence and eroticism. In some quarters, Carrie , Dressed to Kill , Scarface and now Body Double have gained De Palma the reputation of an artist in gore. In Dressed to Kill Angle Dickinson was sliced up with a razor. In Scarface a low-life drug dealer was sent to his reward with a chain saw. In Body Double Deborah Shelton is dispatched by a drill with a huge two-foot bit, which continues through the floor and showers co-star Craig Wasson in the room below with blood. As might be imagined, groups like Women Against Pornography (which protested Dressed to Kill ) have not been happy with Body Double or De Palma. Senior writer William Plummer met with him to discuss his new film and such issues as sex and violence in the movies.

Where did you get the drill idea? I do a lot of murder mysteries, and after a while you get tired of the usual instruments. You can use a knife, a rope, but now we have electrical instruments, which are truly terrifying.

But why a drill? Why one that big? An Indian wants to be witnessed breaking into a safe by the Craig Wasson character. The prop had to be big for Craig to see him across the canyon. It was not my intention to create a sexual image with the drill, although it could be construed that way.

Why do you think people say you’re contemptuous of women? Because I have a lot of women victims in my movies. I also have a lot of men victims. But women in peril work better in the suspense genre. It all goes back to the Perils of Pauline .

They don’t “work better” because you are a man? No. If you have a haunted house and you have a woman walking around with a candelabrum, you fear for her more than you would for a husky man.

So it has to do with female frailty? Absolutely. It’s part of the suspense form. Remember Roy Scheider in The Still of the Night ? He was a man in peril, but it didn’t really work. A blind Audrey Hepburn wandering around in Wait Until Dark , trying to get away from some psychopath trying to kill her, I mean, come on, that was terrifying!

You don’t buy the feminist view that men learn from movies how to assault and rape women? No, no. I subscribe to the Aristotelian theory. I believe that movies purge you of these emotions.

But there are cases where viewers saw The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and— Sure, there are all kinds of cases.

But you don’t feel any responsibility? I don’t feel there’s any connection. I think if you’re dealing with a psychopath, anything can set him off.

Then we shouldn’t hold our artists accountable for violence in their works? No.

Anything goes? We live in a society of free access, free will. We can certainly guide our children about the things we don’t want them to see.

I’ve heard people say that your movies are amoral, if not immoral. I don’t think morality applies to art. It’s a ludicrous idea. I mean, what is the morality of a still life? I don’t think there’s good or bad fruit in the bowl.

Is Body Double pornographic in your view? No. Most people who talk about pornography have never seen it. They use “pornographic” to cover a multitude of sins. A pornographic movie is one that is constructed to make you climax.

Okay, let’s say that your movies are not geared to bring the audience to climax or to teach men how to mutilate women. What kind of emotions are you trying to arouse in moviegoers? I’m interested in shaking up the audience’s sense of reality, jolting it out of conventional ways of perceiving things. That’s what excites me.

Sounds like an old-fashioned notion of the avant-garde. I guess it is. I am, you know, a creature of the ’60s. My first successful, movie had an X rating. I made Dionysus in ’69, a documentary of one of those plays that actually got the audience totally involved in the drama. It’s based on The Bacchae by Euripides. At one point Dionysus says to Pentheus, “What you need is a girl!” And Pentheus says, “I’m king. I can have any girl I want.” To back his boast, Pentheus has to go into the audience, grab some girl and try to have intercourse with her onstage. Let me tell you, there was enormous tension in the audience. Pentheus would be among them; he’d be kissing a girl, stroking her—

These are girls in the audience? Yes. Of course 99 times out of 100 the girl rejects him, but nobody knows what’s going to happen. Everybody gets all shook up, out of control. This is what I’m trying to do today—to introduce avant-garde concepts into very large commercial pictures.

Why do people shriek or laugh at inappropriate moments at De Palma movies? Because they’re so uneasy. They can’t deal with it. Later, in an effort to explain their reactions, they try to rationalize the experience. They say it’s too violent; it’s contemptuous of women. Like Rex Reed, they say it’s horrible garbage. Or the other big cop-out: It’s all satire. They can’t deal with the drill because it’s so viscerally disturbing, so they say it’s parody. I guess the problem is I’ve always been the urban guerrilla. You know, I got a house in California and an apartment here in New York, and I’m very successful, but I’ve still got these ’60s impulses.

So what you’ve got is everybody out of control. The actors in their separate scripts are out of control. The audience is out of control. You, it seems, are the only one in control. Yes. I’m conducting.

Numerous stories quoted throughout De Palma biographies attempt to explain the director’s fascination with death. Oft told is the one about De Palma’s father, a surgeon who let his son (the youngest of three boys) witness medical operations. Many take this as the signifying stressor for De Palma’s liberal use of blood in his films. But this is too superficial a response. Much more pointed and interesting is this story, which Laurent Bouzereau relates in his book ‘The De Palma Cut’:

During his early years, De Palma experienced an event that left with him a sensation of intense terror: his two brothers were playing and young Brian hid behind a refrigerator and got stuck; eventually, he had to cry out for help. Evidently, this event reinforced the inferiority complex De Palma felt toward his brothers, and added to it the fear of being humiliated for losing control.

This anecdote touches on a recurring motif in De Palma’s work, which feeds into his portrayal of death. Helplessness is a constant, an inferiority (or impotence) of both physical and emotional means. A De Palma protagonist rarely has control over the events in which they find themselves embroiled. This springs from a lack of communication, often a verbal or sexual remove from the people around them. Emotions run rampant, as illustrated cinematically by De Palma’s luxurious, fluid camera movements, and inevitably someone ends up dead.

The anecdote specifically recalls De Palma’s film Body Double (1984), the director’s last all-encompassing thriller of the ’80s, which treads on the post-modern impulses he will explore in Raising Cain (1992). Craig Wasson’s Jake Scully is the ultimate example of an impotent De Palma protagonist. A Z-movie actor playing a Z-movie actor may seem like a too-obvious joke, but it is this very lack of star persona that gives Body Double its expressive power. If it was Kirk Douglas or John Travolta decked out in vampire garb in the opening movie-within-a-movie, then the slow disintegration of Scully’s facial expression into abject terror would pack a significantly lesser punch. Minus the buffer of a recognizable face we’re with Scully from the get-go. It’s a distillation of De Palma’s relationship to his audience—his best films are about identifications (between characters, audience, and director) within cinematic moments. — Keith Uhlich, Senses of Cinema

Brian De Palma’s golden rules of shooting a sex scene. Courtesy of MovieMaker Magazine .

1. You have to have the actors and actresses beautifully photographed

Eroticism is a bit of an illusion. You have to really capture the naked body, like beautiful paintings of nude women. I stress the fact that they must be exquisitely photographed. With the advent of the digital revolution, love scenes are not very well lit, and directors don’t seem to pay much attention to the way the actors look. Just the fact that you can see them seems to be enough. And to me, that isn’t the illusion I like to create on screen.

2. Find the right cinematographer

In Body Double , I spent a lot of time searching for the right cinematographer. I actually did screen tests for different DPs. I had these incredibly attractive women, and I wanted to make sure they were lensed correctly. That’s when I discovered Steven Burum, and I used him for many films after that.

3. You need some kind of conceptual idea

Today, there’s such an incredible amount of lovemaking and nudity on cable television, and in pornography on the Internet. You see bodies photographed from every conceivable angle, doing every conceivable thing, so you really have to think hard to approach eroticism with a fresh idea. Just showing people kissing, people fucking—it’s of no interest to me.

4. Don’t underestimate the power of a kiss

Watching Alfred Hitchcock, the first thing you learn about kissing is that you have to see the actor’s faces. You have to see them reacting to the kiss. Watch Cary Grant kissing Ingrid Bergman in Notorious . A lot of filmmakers think that just showing people kissing each other, and having a very good time, is enough. But so often their eyes are closed, and you can’t see their faces. The audience is completely shut out. In Hitchcock movies, you can see that they are kissing each other on the neck, and talking. They’re kissing lightly on the lips, and you can see their eyes. You see how they’re reacting. That’s what creates the eroticism of the scene.

5. Using onscreen sex scenes only for shock value is passé

I don’t think the big screen is the place where most people go to see erotica. Cable television and pornography don’t face the same restrictions as theatrically-released films, so they can be a lot more explicit. So don’t try to shock a movie audience with sex. It’s passé. As far as remembering a shocking sex scene in a movie on the big screen? I can’t really think of one. Angie Dickinson’s shower scene in Dressed to Kill would be kind of decorous today. I don’t think too many people would be shocked. On cable, people are being stripped and raped all the time. Just a naked girl in the shower? Please!

6. You have to have foreplay

You’ve got to have a way to build up the tension and mystery. Just showing two people kissing and then making out in bed? There’s no illusion there! It’s very meat and potatoes. You might as well just turn the page! You’ve seen that scene a thousand times. There’s a lot of playfulness to eroticism. You have to slowly evoke it. That’s what’s so beautiful about Passion, I think. It’s about these two dancers and the connection with each other that ultimately ends up with the simplest kind of kiss. But it’s so exquisitely drawn out that it has a tremendous amount of sensual impact. You have to have the foreplay.

7. Watch Ryan’s Daughter

There’s one great lovemaking scene in Ryan’s Daughter . She finally has a rendezvous with a military man. It’s exquisitely well done. You really feel the sense of nature surrounding the eroticism. Because [director David] Lean had an idea! Take a girl in a field and make love to her. The feel and the sensuality of the nature around them as they’re getting into the lovemaking—it’s quite good.

[DE PALMA’S] VISION

An audiovisual essay and text on Brian De Palma’s fantasy-scenarios and his motifs relating to the idea of vision by Cristina Álvarez López and Adrian Martin. Courtesy of MUBI’s Notebook .

Here are several photos taken behind-the-scenes during production of Brian De Palma’s Body Double . Production still photographer: Ralph Nelson © Columbia Pictures Corporation, Delphi II Productions.

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Body Double Reviews

The plot keeps putting you with Jake as he flails ineffectually, frozen outside of the narrative, just like the viewer.

Full Review | Jul 16, 2023

It’s pretty self-aware of DePalma and co-writer Robert J. Avrech to play on the former’s reputation for mistreating female characters by making the whole film about the male lead’s insecurities and inefficiencies.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Apr 21, 2023

Loved Body Double for the same reasons I've loved all his other films: fluid, breath-taking camera work, glossy, sensual imagery, a gorgeous Pino Donnagio score and the satisfying feeling that an assured master manipulator has you eating out of his hand.

Full Review | Jul 22, 2022

It's not so much like a Hitchcock thriller as it is a Mel Brooks comedy.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/10 | Aug 31, 2020

'Body Double' remains as a palpable testimony of the immense influence that Alfred Hitchcock's cinema had on the generations that knew how to see in him the same as Truffaut. [Full Review in Spanish]

Full Review | May 7, 2020

It's an expertly crafted B-movie, a brisk and twisty mixture of the slick and sleazy, the glossy and grungy.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 18, 2018

... "Body Double" finds Brian De Palma at the zenith of his cinematic virtuosity.

Full Review | Jan 4, 2018

...ugly, unedifying exploitation cinema.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Jun 9, 2016

A spectacularly sleazy send-up that finds the puckish, thin-skinned director confronting his critics and doubling down on everything that upstanding, respectable people hate about Brian De Palma films.

Full Review | Feb 8, 2016

Is Body Double Brian De Palma's most underrated film or merely a guilty pleasure on my part? Naturally, I make the case for the former.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Aug 24, 2013

Sleaze dominates the thin plot and absurd story line.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Jun 11, 2012

Classic De Palma. Stylish and Sexy.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Sep 5, 2008

Full Review | Original Score: 1/5 | Dec 30, 2006

It's a mystery, a romance, a horror flick, and a straight-faced parody all rolled into one unique little movie.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 1, 2006

...De Palma's expectedly grandiose directorial choices go a long way towards keeping things interesting...

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 13, 2006

Emblematizes De Palma's refusal to take Hollywood seriously.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 1, 2006

Body Double, while not his finest, is the best candidate as Brian De Palma's signature film.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4 | Aug 29, 2006

enough to portend the downfall of civilization... a guilty pleasure

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Aug 17, 2006

Another sexed-up Hitchcockian thriller from Brian De Palma. Plays much better today than it did in 1984.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Jan 24, 2006

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 9, 2005

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Film review: body double (1984).

Adrian Halen 07/05/2012 Cult Films

A young actor’s obsession with spying on a beautiful woman who lives nearby leads to a baffling series of events with drastic consequences.

Jake Scully (Craig Wasson) is having a bad day. A struggling actor who has bouts of claustrophobia comes home to find his wife Carol (played by horror hottie Barbara Crampton) making love to another man. Jake just trying to get the next audition ends up meeting a colleague who recognizes his down-and-out position. This man is fellow actor Sam Bouchard (Gregg Henry) who “happens” to be house sitting for a friend. Sam who has to leave for another job, offers the place to Jake as a temporary place to reside while Jake is getting his life back together. Upon introduction to the unique structure, Sam also introduces Jake to the neighbor across the way who performs a nighty solo erotic dance routine. Jake is able to view the performance thru a telescope aka “Peeping Tom” style.

The whole affair is perfectly set in motion with Jake now hooked and a future murder mystery about to unfold. Jake who can’t help by watch every night notices a rather grungy looking Indian who has also taken an interest to the neighbor. Jake begins to follow his neighbor Gloria Revelle (Deborah Shelton) in hopes of alerting her to the assumed intentions of the peeping Indian. There is a sense of dark humor here as Jake “also” becomes the stalker (of which he is trying to alert Gloria about).

All is uniquely rolled out changing the viewpoints from each of the characters involved. While Jake’s intentions seem harmless, they also mirror the intentions of the nasty Indian. This conflict is always apparent to the audience which recognizes the irony of it all.

Now onto a few spoilers: Jake later learns that the dance reunite which originally drew him in is the same routine that local p0rn star “Holly Body” is noted for in her films. Jake begins to change roles from the curiosity-seeker to the role of a detective trying to piece the clues together. To get closer to Holly, he attends a surreal audition that evolves into a movie/music video (Frankie and the Knockouts). He changes his identity to a auditioning producer/actor in order to learn about Holly’s involvement.

Director Brian De Palma approaches this particular product with style reminiscent of his influences such as Alfred Hitchcock. The film could as easily been played out in a typical manner, but its those De Palma scenes and moments that really define this movie. Great use of paranoia, fear, mystery, tension, horror and sexuality all come together in a hodge-podge thriller. The use of Jake’s claustrophobia and how its additionally presented on screen not only reaffirm his emotional state, but we tend to feel it ourselves. This can be seen used to great affect in the hallway scenes and the burial scene in the final act. There is a portion of the film that also cleverly mirrors its title with the boldly displayed “Body Double” factor actually becoming a part of the premise itself. To further entertain fans, Brian De Palma ends the final credits with a behind the scenes look at a body double in action.

Cult flavorings season the entire production with a few moments that change from story-in-progress to surreal breakouts. We never lose the intention of the film, but also are never left a moment for boredom. Ideas are never introduced without returning to them for purpose in this production.

“ Body Double ” represents a crowning cinematic moment for “sometimes” cult film director Brian De Palma. The film itself would last in the memories of generations to come creating its own brand of cult following. Masterfully executed with just the right blend of tension, music, and character creativity, “Body Double” would carry over form its 1984 debut as a stand alone film to remember.

That equally memorable track by composer Pino Donaggio would attach itself to the film as not just a score piece but an identity signaling the famous scenes executed by Melanie Griffith. Melanie would capture the attraction of drooling fan boys as the highly sexually alluring Holly Body. It probably didn’t hurt that she played the role of a p0rn actress in the film. Often I found myself coming back to the movie to see how “often” I could recognize Melanie’s face in that opener solo dance. Melanie had just come from the production of “Fear City”, though it is her role in “Body Double” that would remain a staple role for her career. Soon after she went on to do the additionally great role in the film “Something Wild”.

Body Double” is one of film great early offerings full of surprise, mystery and reveal . Fans of the director’s work will most certainly have to place this among his best. Highly recommended with years of return.

Body Double (1984)

Tags Body Double Brian De Palma Craig Wasson Deborah Shelton Dennis Franz Gregg Henry Guy Boyd Melanie Griffith

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One comment.

Great movie!!

Brian De Palma Was ‘Upset’ Over Pauline Kael’s Poor Review of ‘Body Double’

Samantha bergeson.

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Brian De Palma apparently was less than enthused by Pauline Kael ‘s scathing “ Body Double ” review. The legendary critic didn’t seem to grasp what De Palma was attempting with his 1984 meta noir send-up of Hollywood.

The auteur’s take on “Rear Window” centered on a struggling actor (Craig Wasson) who seems to witness a murder while housesitting for his friend’s ( Gregg Henry ) pal. His relationship with a rising young porn actress (Melanie Griffith) leads to him investigating whether or not his voyeurism could solve a crime.

“You always look at things differently as you look back at them,” Henry told IndieWire of revisiting “Body Double” almost a half century later. “But the movie was received in a very sort of harsh manner by a lot of critics. [De Palma] got some good reviews but of course, but Pauline Kael, who was a big Brian fan, she didn’t like it at all. He was a bit upset about that.”

In fact, Kael called the film a “stupid yet moderately entertaining” installment in De Palma’s filmography.

“Coming from De Palma, ‘Body Double’ is an awful disappointment: the voyeuristic themes and the scare sequences are so similar to elements of his earlier movies that you keep waiting for the thrills — the moments when he’ll top himself. And he doesn’t,” Kael wrote in the review originally published in the November 12, 1984 edition of The New Yorker. “He has grown past this material, and he must know it.”

Kael even called De Palma’s illusions to “Vertigo” and “Rear Window” so blatant that the “movie is like an assault on the people who have put De Palma down for being derivative.”

“It wasn’t a box office smash and it wasn’t promoted heavily or endorsed by critics at the time,” Henry said. “It was not enthusiastically endorsed by the studio. They kept the opening on the down low, you know what I mean? Now, that might be just my opinion. Go talk to the marketing budget people who might tell you something different. But I don’t think so. I think it was pretty understated in terms of the publicity because it was dealing with porn stars and looking at Hollywood in a sort of satirical way. It had all kinds of dark sort of things and Brian could be prickly when dealing with those studio types as well.”

That “prickliness” from De Palma was rooted in the mainstream pressure within Hollywood to conform to a particular genre. De Palma, rather, built his auteurism upon commenting on the state of the film industry as a whole rather than succumbing to it.

“I think part of it is what we were just talking about a little bit ago is that there’s, you know, well, ‘How am I supposed to classify this? What pigeonhole can we put this in?'” Henry said. “‘Well, it’s funny but it’s kind of scary.’ ‘Well, it’s just a thriller.’ ‘Well, he said it is like ‘Rear Window.” Just on and on, the way people talk about Brian’s movies.”

“I think that he had it before that but I think at that point in time, it’s like it becomes this sort of stamp along with the score,” Henry said of “Body Double” being distinctly De Palma-esque. “You can see like, you know, five seconds from across a large room and go, ‘Oh, that’s all pretty unusual.’ I mean, it’s unusual for, like, a singer’s voice or a painter’s paintings or anything.”

The tone of “Body Double” just might be what audience members are trying to unravel. While the film is no doubt a thriller, that’s not where the core tension comes from onscreen. Rather, it’s the toying with parody, power, and pleasure that De Palma deftly explores both with his camera work and script.

“I just think a lot of it is tongue in cheek,” Henry said. “A lot of scenes are humorous and poke fun at the movie business, certainly. It fires off in a lot of directions.”

Like that old Hollywood saying, films that criticize Hollywood don’t ever really find their appreciation in Hollywood. Don’t bite the hand, et cetera, et cetera. Henry finds “Body Double” “still funny” 40 years later, but also is aware that modern audiences may find some of the sequences a little more complex in today’s political climate.

Henry continued, “I think some of the sense of humor might not play but some of the things that are funny to me, that are funny to Brian…I mean, he has that romantic spinning and 360 shot of the embrace which is really difficult to do and he does them really beautifully, with the score swelling. Those things make me laugh, you know. But then I don’t know if they make anybody else laugh. The same with the drilling scene. I just remember we’re talking about which bit we’re going to use and I’m saying to myself, ‘I know Brian’s going to go for that, which is huge,’ and that was the one he wanted. Then we’re shooting it in the blocking of it all. I had forgotten this, but it started with this crazy shot with using the drill horizontally, sort of going like as a sword going into her and everything. Then ultimately she’s on the ground and I said, ‘Well, I know what you want’ and I turned around with the drill and I sat down and started to swing it between my legs [like a penis]. And he said, ‘Yeah, that’ll be great.'”

From improvised phallic weaponry to cinematography Easter egg jokes, it makes sense why “Body Double” proved it could transcend its (or any) genre. “It’s sufficiently scary but it’s also very funny,” Henry said.

“I did James’ first movie, ‘Slither,’ with him, which has a similar sort of sensibility in terms of humor,” Henry said. “James and Brian are really my favorite people as directors.”

Like with De Palma, Henry continued to work with Gunn and appeared in the “Guardians of the Galaxy” trilogy.

As for “Body Double,” Henry couldn’t help but lament on the greatness of De Palma.

“I’m extremely proud to have done a lot of movies with Brian and I’m proud of being in this movie, even though it deals with some dicey and juicy areas,” Henry said. “I think he’s a masterful filmmaker and I think he is a stylist like very few directors are. It’s been an honor to be able to work with him.”

And “Body Double” definitely is worth a double take: “I think it sort of gained more of a cult status but it’s seeing more appreciation over the years from a certain group of people,” Henry concluded. “I definitely do think it’s at that cult level, especially to be promoted theatrically by Netflix [which] is a big deal.”

Metacritic reviews

Body double.

100 Slant Magazine Eric Henderson Slant Magazine Eric Henderson Body Double, while not his finest, is the best candidate as De Palma’s signature film. It’s a wicked, feature-length double entendre from a Doublemint era. Take it at face value, take it for its prurience or take it for all it’s worth. Hell, try taking on all three at once.
91 The Film Stage The Film Stage De Palma’s exuberant style comes to perfect use when dream and reality become thus entwined: as soon as Jake and Gloria’s lips meet, the camera starts encircling the couple frenetically, as though struggling to capture this spiral of pure pleasure, while a green screen projection of the beach replaces the real one.
90 The Telegraph Robbie Collin The Telegraph Robbie Collin Body Double isn’t trash, misogynistic or otherwise. It’s unrepentantly trashy – not the kind of film you watch while your parents or kids are in the house, or with your curtains open. But it’s also a complex, provocative suspense thriller that bears comparison with the three immaculate Hitchcock classics – Vertigo, Psycho and Rear Window – it gleefully drags through the sludge.
90 The New York Times Vincent Canby The New York Times Vincent Canby It's sexy and explicitly crude, entertaining and sometimes very funny. It's his most blatant variation to date on a Hitchcock film ("Vertigo"), but it's also a De Palma original, a movie that might have offended Hitchcock's wryly avuncular public personality, while appealing to his darker, most private fantasies.
90 Chicago Reader Dave Kehr Chicago Reader Dave Kehr Brian De Palma has gotten a bad rap on this one: the first hour of his 1984 thriller represents the most restrained, accomplished, and effective filmmaking he's ever done, and if the film does become more jokey and incontinent as it follows its derivative path, it never entirely loses the goodwill De Palma engenders with his deft opening sequences.
88 Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert Body Double is an exhilarating exercise in pure filmmaking, a thriller in the Hitchcock tradition in which there's no particular point except that the hero is flawed, weak, and in terrible danger -- and we identify with him completely. The movie is so cleverly constructed, with the emphasis on visual storytelling rather than dialogue, that we are neither faster nor slower than the hero as he gradually figures out the scheme that has entrapped him.
70 Time Out London Time Out London De Palma actually has the gall to combine the plots from both Vertigo and Rear Window in one big voyeur-fest and pull it off with a certain sly efficiency.
60 Empire Kim Newman Empire Kim Newman Once you get past the ridiculous story this is a fine example of De Palma's lush overkill style and certainly has a redeeming thread of silly sick humour.
50 Variety Variety Brian De Palma lets all his obsessions hang out in Body Double. A voyeur’s delight and a feminist’s nightmare, sexpenser features an outrageously far-fetched and flimsy plot.
40 TV Guide Magazine TV Guide Magazine Contrived, shallow, distasteful, and ultimately pointless, BODY DOUBLE is more an exercise in empty cinematic style than an engrossing thriller. Although cinematographer Burum executes some absolutely breathtaking camera moves, his effort goes for naught when pitted against director De Palma and cowriter Avrech's insipid narrative. What De Palma has done here is simply take elements from two superb Alfred Hitchcock films, REAR WINDOW and VERTIGO, and combine them into one insipid film. While Griffith is sexy and appealing in her role, Wasson's character is so bland that he generates little interest.
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