Difference between a 'rip-off' and an 'Homage'
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Dressed to Kill
ChorusGirl — 14 years ago(April 16, 2011 06:33 PM)
Oh boythese comments calling DTK a Hithcock "rip off," then dutifully listing all the similarities.
A rip-off is when a director wants you to think these are his original ideas.
An homage is when the similarities are so hilariously, blatantly obvious (the "reveal" conversation with the psychiatrist, for one) that the director knows he is borrowing the scenes, and HE knows that YOU know.
It takes skill to pull this offyou need to add your own slant to what you've borrowed, and make it your own as well. You have to make clear you arent trivializing the original sourceyou are honoring it. DePalma is (or rather was) great at it.
Put your pitchforks and torches away. The borrowing was intentional, and not perpetrated as a fraud. -
FawnOmatic — 11 years ago(May 01, 2014 03:13 PM)
I'm with you!
This particular movie was screaming "Argento".
I didn't care for this movie but do like a few of his others. I watched it primarily because I first saw Body Double and then was told I had to watch this. I enjoyed B.D. more but only because of the garishly 80s scene going on. -
Euphrosyne — 14 years ago(November 12, 2011 09:30 PM)
"An homage is when the similarities are so hilariously, blatantly obvious (the "reveal" conversation with the psychiatrist, for one) that the director knows he is borrowing the scenes, and HE knows that YOU know
It takes skill to pull this off."
Don't necessarily disagree with you, I just don't think that DePalma was good enough to pull it off.
Really not impressed with this "homage". -
Euphrosyne — 14 years ago(March 31, 2012 01:00 PM)
Still not convinced about DePalma's skill with this homage - but I was lucky enough to catch "Vertigo", at a local, historic, movie palace. Really gave me an even better appreciation of that great movie!
Again - don't know how good DePalma was with the homage, but Hitchcock left some really big shoes to fill. -
Cherubim1 — 13 years ago(April 11, 2012 05:38 AM)
This film and others like Blow Out are shameful ripoffs of Hitchcocks style, direction, pacing and even elements of dialogue.
DePalma is a hack with no original ideas of his own. There is no doubt about this and the criticism leveled against him is totally justified. -
LeonardPine — 11 years ago(March 27, 2015 03:50 AM)
Well Hitch never used split-screen. Watch De Palma's skill at split-screen in his film, Sisters. The murder and witness to the murder happening simultaneously. Brilliantly created sequence that no other director has ever attempted.
Also the B/W nightmare sequence in Sisters is horror tour de force. Never sen anything like that even in a David Lynch movie.
Was it a millionaire who said "Imagine no possessions"? -
aaahmemories — 10 years ago(April 21, 2015 07:12 PM)
the B/W nightmare sequence in Sisters is horror tour de force. Never sen anything like
Amen to that. One of the most unsettling sequences in all cinema. Interestingly, I came to De Palma through Phantom and didn't see Sisters until many years later, after having devoured all De Palma's subsequent work. This timorous excuse that he "rips off" other directors is IMO the last resort of minds which simply can't grasp the nuances of film, never mind art in general. Calling De Palma a Hitchcock cloneor an Argento clone, or an imitator of any other director for that matter simply reveals an eye deaf to remarkable film making.
Religion is like a rocking chair a lot of work to get nowhere. -
kenneymljken — 13 years ago(October 14, 2012 02:21 AM)
There are clear allusions to "Psycho" in "Dressed to Kill" (a transvestite murderer, the lead female character killed early in the film and the psychiatrist's explanation of the killer's motives at the end) but that hardly makes it a rip-off. It's a great movie on its own.
Just thought I'd throw my own two cents in. -
baheidstu-351-733122 — 13 years ago(December 14, 2012 03:20 PM)
Brian De Palma is from a certain generation of film-makers who went to film school and learned by watching older, classic films. If George Lucas can get away with adapting the plot of Hidden Fortress and footage of World War 2 dogfight films for Star Wars and not invite hostility, I cannot see why Brian De Palma has to endure such criticisms for emulating the type of films that he likes.
De Palma has been paid homage by younger film-makers himself many times, particularly with Scarface. -
thomas-begen — 11 years ago(October 01, 2014 09:19 PM)
With all due respect to Di Palma, who has shown he is a talented director, I believe a "homage," like a remake, should be more interesting than the original.
"Body Double," for instance, obviously plays with Hitchcock's "Vertigo" and "Rear Window."
The movie is terrible: terrible acting, mediocre directing, and an unconvincing plot. The movie is unbearable to watch.
"Vertigo" is probably one of Hitchcock's most overrated movies. It had a great idea ruined by poor casting, Stewart and Novak, poor execution, and an unsatisfying ending. "Body Double" could have at least tried to do something interesting with the original ideas. Instead it bastardized and trivialized them. -
tobias_681 — 10 years ago(April 21, 2015 01:04 PM)
I think there are some obvious plotdevices which De Palma probably included as a homage: The museum scene (Vertigo), the crossdresser-killer (Psycho), observing a near-killing with binoculars (Rear Window), shift of lead-character (Psycho), prominent shower scenes (Psycho), a chase involving a train (reminiscent of multiple Hitchcock films).
If this is a rip-off it's truly one that isn't sure which movie it is ripping off after all. You can find tons of other influences in there. Flashy nudity, giallolike killings (involving a razorblade as weapen) and dream sequenses weren't exactly part of Hitchcock's repetoir and obviously came from somewhere else. Dressed to Kill has multiple influences but which movie hasn't? If it was to be a ripp-off, it would have to follow a movie much more closely than it does, with all the different stuff it combines, it deviates a lot from the proclaimed "source" and is a movie in it's own right. Brian De Palma and Hitchcock are similar when it comes to characters. They both use clever visual set-ups to present their characters as opposed to dialouge and by those means it's obvious for De Palma to borrow certain story elements for presentation. What he makes of it is entirely different though. Hitchcock's and De Palma's visual style aren't alike and De Palma focusses much more on single scenes (in every movie I've seen by him there are extremely obvious standout scenes which suceed all the others), while Hitchcock focusses more on story (obviously there are standout scenes aswell but still are rooted in the movie).
The explanation at the end is an obvious homage as it is so close to Psycho and feels highly self-aware (the scene didn't actually fit in in my opinion). The musuem scene is probably a hommage aswell because it's so similarily set-up. I wouldn't necessarily dub the other similarities I've listed homages though. De Palma might have added those because he's a huge Hitchcock fan but they don't work like a homage in the movie, but as an element of their own.
You see things; and you say Why? But I dream things that never were and I say Why not? -
pufduff — 10 years ago(August 08, 2015 07:16 PM)
De Palma has stated he idolized Hitchcock, why would he steal his style if it is so obvious and apparent in his films. His films Sisters, Body Double, Dressed To Kill, Blow Out, and Raising Cain are all tributes and odes to Hitchcock. No-one made movies like Hitchcock in the seventies, De Palma was bringing him back. Nothing is identical or legit "copying." Thats like saying Scary Movie is ripping off Scream, or Quentin Tarantino in Kill Bill was ripping off Japanese cinema. DePalma is showing who inspired his style, his angles, his frames, the sequences are actually his own style. The whole "background and foreground are in focus" thing is DePalma's,
http://myscreens.fr/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Carrie-6.jpg
the split screen thing = De Palma
http://www.mondo-digital.com/sisters3big.jpg
; The slo mo sequences [in Carrie and The Fury], when did Hitchcock ever use slo motion? He has been very inventive with his camera work and choices. -
andyk69 — 10 years ago(September 09, 2015 01:39 AM)
I rewatched after a lot of years DTK yesterday,
I love Hitchcock and I don't see any rippoff of him,
DTK has merit on its own,
what I did think during this rewatching is how Argento's Suspiria
is the elevator scene, amazing and maybe it was just me who
thought this but it was brilliant.
