Horror Extreme Movie Catalog

This is a great film! Although the acting is a bit rough for a few characters I found myself drawn into the story line. We have Danielle Breton (Margot Kidder) has a one-night stand with a black TV-game show player. The morning after, he is killed by Danielle's psycho twin sister, Dominique Blanchion. But Grace Collier (Jennifer Salt), an aspiring journalist, sees everything from her flat across the street. Things get even uglier when the journalist starts following Danielle and his strange ex-husband, Dr. Emil Breton (De Palma perennial weirdo Bill Finley). What dark secret lies behind this murder? Uh? Of course, nobody really seems to care about the plot - De Palma plays the genre rules, twisting every second with his split screen techniques and neat suspense touches. There is a "dream" sequence, some blood, a hideous scar, drugs and a birthday cake.

Sure, the movie owes more than a passing nod to Psycho (Collector's Edition) and Rear Window (Collector's Edition)specifically, but De Palma's exhilarating use of that split-screen technique as well as Margot Kidder's creepy performance add up to a genuinely frightening experience. The "peeping tom" opening is brilliant. The humor doesn't lessen the shock, but rather enhances it by keeping the audience continually caught off guard. He takes the most vulnerable and receptive of human reactions--laughter, fear, and anticipation--and pushes them to their extremes until the audience is caught up in giddy bewilderment. You don't know what the director is going to pull next, so you can't prepare yourself.

De Palma is nothing if not a visceral filmmaker, and in his comfort with the comic and the horrific, he resembles Roman Polanski more than he does Hitchcock. Taking into consideration their mutually varied filmographies and how they've been received, it seems a more apt comparison. The one major difference is that Polanski has a deep sense of the tragic, and almost always ends on that note. Not so much De Palma. In the final scene in Sisters, we find Charles Durning's private dick, who had all but disappeared from the movie, high up on a telephone pole dressed as an electrician, dutifully watching a couch through a pair of binoculars. The movie is over in every way--the blood has been shed, the mystery has been solved, and the suspense is gone--except that it apparently isn't. De Palma wants to leave us with something else. So we have Durning waiting to see who comes to get the couch. This could well be that Shock Recovery Period that the movie posters promoted. This was another great film that was highly recommended by Chris and the one only #1 Depalma fan R.A. Bean which I greatly enjoyed.

In 1973, after spending the last few years making great independant films like "Murder a La Mod", "The Wedding Party", "Greetings", and "Hi, Mom!", Brian Depalma was put on the map as the new Master Of Suspense with his first 'mainstream' film, "Sisters", a very demented, deranged, twisted, psychological horror film that rivals even the best of todays top thrillers. He uses themes that would continue throughout his career in this film: The doppleganger, split personalities, multiple personality disorder(s), mistaken identity, voyuerism, and horrorfying psychological madness and muder and mayhem. And sinister satire!
The film starts as a game show "Peeping Toms" is being played out before a live audience. The contestant on the show, a young black man named Philip Woode (Lisle Wilson), and the guest 'prankster', a model named Danillele Breton (Margot Kidder in her BEST performance ever). After the show is over, Philip recieves a gift card which is a ticket for two to have a free dinner at an African themed restaraunt, and for Danielle's participation on the show, she recieves a very nice set of steak knives (establishing sterotypes and irony in one set piece).
They attend dinner together, where they are followed by Danielle's ex-husband, Emil Breton (William Finley), but he is removed from the restaraunt; so they have a very nice dinner together, then go to Danielle's to spend the night together. As they are making out, we are shown a very large, ugly scar on Danielle's thigh.?.?.
The next morning, there is loud yelling from the next room, someone calling out "Danielle! Danielle!" in a very impatient voice that awakens Danielle, who goes to respond, having a conversation, one person speaking French, and Danielle in French-English (the accent she has throughout the entire film); then coming back and telling Philip that it was her sister, well, her twin sister, Dominique, and she is upset because today is their birthday, and she wanted to spend the day together, and is upset that Danielle has a man in the apartment. Philip gets dressed, and goes to the local pharmacy for Danielle to pick up a prescription for her, and in the meantime he drops by a local bakery and buys a birthday cake for the twin sisters, Dominique and Danielle. When he returns to the apatment, he is murdered in a very shocking scene that I will not detail for I don't wanna spoil it for people who haven't seen the film.
From a window in a buiding next to Danielle's apartment building, a young female reporter, Grace Collier (Jennifer Salt) witnesses the entire muder in an awesome split screen scene that DePalma first employed in this film; and, in which he uses effectively in a few more scenes. She calls the cops, there is an investigation, but no body is found, but this is when Grace starts noticing signs and/or clues that Danielle may have a sister, a TWIN sister, and all is not what it appears to be; so, she hires a private detective, Joseph Larch (Charles Durning). He finds a folder that has files on the Blanchion twins, an infamous story about two Siamese twins who got seperated about a year before, so Grace investigates the story further by seeking out the top reporter that was there during the operation, Mr. McClennon (Bernard Hughes), who tells Grace that Dominique died on the operating table.?.?.?.
And, this leads Grace, who in her (God bless her heart) naivete, and stubborness, and her drive to someday be a 'respected' journalist, on a search that ends in a psychological/sinister/demented/deranged/almost psychodelic/hypnotic/kaleidoscopic/bloody climax that will leave you utterly stunned, breathless, and scared witless!
And, the final twist at the end, where a particular character is watching a particular item through binoculars until the cows (literally) come home is awesome and utterly hilarious, but also very bone chilling all the same.
Of special mention: DePalma cast Jennifer Salt's real-life mother, Mary Davenport as Grace's mother. One of the cops was played by Dolph Sweet, who is remembered for his role on the tv sitcom "Gimme A Break". And, the awesome score was done by the great Bernard Herrmann, who DePalma got to come out of retirement to do, and who went on to score DePalma's "Obsession". And, DePalma originally wanted to get bigger name stars for the roles of Grace and Philip: He wanted to get Marlo Thomas to play Grace, and Sydney Poitner to play Philip, but due to budget constraints, and/or other reasons, that never came to fuition, which in my opinion is a good thing, because what may have appeared as a good idea on paper, I don't think would have worked as well on screen. Jennifer Salt (who had been in DePalma's "The Wedding Party" and "Hi, Mom!") was born for this role, and Lisle Wilson gave a very topnotch performance as the 'male Janet Leigh'.
This is a very great mixture of genres, mainly horror and satire, and something that will stick in the recesses of your mind and stay there for days and days to come, and haunt you on a very deep scale.
As one reviewer on here put it, this isn't DePalma's first film, but in many ways, it is the first 'Brian DePalma film'. Easily in the same league as "Psycho", "Halloween", "Suspiria", "Rosemary's Baby", "Repulsion", and referencing such greats as "Rope", "Rear Window", "Psycho", and "The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari", this is a very timeless classic masterpiece that will rival anything in its genre that you've ever seen! And, why Margot Kidder didn't have every award there is thrown at her for her performance is a crime, for she is show stopping in this.
Currently, there is a remake of this trying to get thatrical disribution...AVOID it!!!
This is the ONLY version of "Sisters" you'll ever want and/or need to see!
Thank you & happy Halloween! ;-)