Kill Me Again (1989)

The first of John Dahl's neo-noir forrays.

Kill Me Again is directed by John Dahl and Dahl co-writes the screenplay with David W. Warfield. It stars Val Kilmer, Joanne Whalley, Michael Madsen, Pat Mulligan and Nick Dimitri. Music is by William Olvis and cinematography by Jacques Steyn.

Detective Jack Andrews (Kilmer) becomes involved with a beautiful woman on the run from the mob and her psychopath boyfriend.

John Dahl loves film noir, we know that now after all these years. He would direct the superb Red Rock West and The Last Seduction, two bona fide greats from the neo-noir splinter of film making. Kill Me Again (classic film noir title right there) is his fist directorial feature film venture, it is like a lot of debuts from directors who have a kink for a certain genre or style of film making, in that it only hints at better things to come.

Unfortunately, in spite of being solid enough within the noir parameters, it's all a bit too derivative for its own good. Standard noir tropes are adhered to, male protag led into the murk by a femme fatale, a bruising psycho, some twists and turns, and some stylistics via camera and photographic lenses. Plot relies on the salty machinations of Whalley's femme for its intrigue, and for the most part her character is the dominating factor, but later on the film sort of bypasses her character and it begins to sag as Kilmer's weary P.I. plods onwards.

Fans of the actors do have interest value (though Kilmer is a little miscast and a world away from great neo-noir films he would later do; Heat, The Salton Sea, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang), but really the performances are neither good or bad - though Madsen holds court every scene he is in. Although the screenplay and script are merely serviceable as pot boilers, there's just enough here to keep you watching till the culmination of proceedings.

Fans of noir can grab enough from the pic to warrant time investment, but it doesn't linger long afterwards. While casual film fans are warned to use this only as a time filling exercise. 6/10