You may only know Tony Curtis as a matinée-idol with a twinkle in his eye. Hollywood certainly typecast him as that before this movie came out. After it, they didn't seem to know what to do with him and his career as a star faded badly and he ended up doing television.
Nothing can prepare you for the power of Tony Curtis's performance as Albert De Salvo in this movie. He should have won an Oscar for it but didn't. He wasn't even nominated and has never won an Academy Award. (Ironically, Tony Curtis re-dubbed "Spartacus" with Anthony Hopkins the same year he played Hannibal Lecter and won an Oscar for it, a win that would never have been possible without performances like Tony's in "The Boston Strangler" that pushed the boundaries and made playing serial killers worthy of Oscars). It is a complex and extremely honest performance. Tony Curtis said he used emotional memory during the harrowing final scenes, which is method-acting in all but name. It is as good as anything Brando did but is also a performance that is shamefully overlooked and forgotten about these days.
Sure, the split-screen technique is dated, but it was very fashionable at the time (see The Thomas Crown Affair of the same year). Tony Curtis reunites with the director of "The Vikings", Richard Fleischer, for a very different type of movie. Fleischer does a great job of maintaining the air of mystery, suspense and horror throughout with some entertaining comic relief to lighten the mood (just look at the parade of weird perverts the cops shake down in their hunt for the killer).
There is some interesting movie history going on here. Tony Curtis plays the Boston Strangler, his first wife, Janet Leigh, played Marion Crane in Hitchcock's "Psycho" and their daughter, Jamie Lee Curtis became a scream queen in movies like "Halloween" "Prom Night" and "Terror Train." (Jamie Lee and Janet Leigh acted together in the horror movies "The Fog" and "Halloween H20." Sadly, Jamie Lee never got to act with her father Tony.)
"The Boston Strangler" was a film ahead of its time. Censorship was just ending in Hollywood in 1968 and audiences weren't really ready for a film as brutal and realistic as this. Highly recommended...just don't watch it alone!
Nothing can prepare you for the power of Tony Curtis's performance as Albert De Salvo in this movie. He should have won an Oscar for it but didn't. He wasn't even nominated and has never won an Academy Award. (Ironically, Tony Curtis re-dubbed "Spartacus" with Anthony Hopkins the same year he played Hannibal Lecter and won an Oscar for it, a win that would never have been possible without performances like Tony's in "The Boston Strangler" that pushed the boundaries and made playing serial killers worthy of Oscars). It is a complex and extremely honest performance. Tony Curtis said he used emotional memory during the harrowing final scenes, which is method-acting in all but name. It is as good as anything Brando did but is also a performance that is shamefully overlooked and forgotten about these days.
Sure, the split-screen technique is dated, but it was very fashionable at the time (see The Thomas Crown Affair of the same year). Tony Curtis reunites with the director of "The Vikings", Richard Fleischer, for a very different type of movie. Fleischer does a great job of maintaining the air of mystery, suspense and horror throughout with some entertaining comic relief to lighten the mood (just look at the parade of weird perverts the cops shake down in their hunt for the killer).
There is some interesting movie history going on here. Tony Curtis plays the Boston Strangler, his first wife, Janet Leigh, played Marion Crane in Hitchcock's "Psycho" and their daughter, Jamie Lee Curtis became a scream queen in movies like "Halloween" "Prom Night" and "Terror Train." (Jamie Lee and Janet Leigh acted together in the horror movies "The Fog" and "Halloween H20." Sadly, Jamie Lee never got to act with her father Tony.)
"The Boston Strangler" was a film ahead of its time. Censorship was just ending in Hollywood in 1968 and audiences weren't really ready for a film as brutal and realistic as this. Highly recommended...just don't watch it alone!