★★★★★

Yes, I give Crimes of Passion five stars. I saw this movie when it was first released on VHS during my college days. It is even more important of a movie today than it was then. I see some enterprising geeks are remastering it for 2K now as well.

Crimes of Passion came out during the golden age of movies. No, I don’t mean the old fogy black & white golden age, I mean that brave new pre-Internet world of VHS and Betamax. This was the post Deep Throat world where brave women were embracing their sexuality and finding power in it. Yes, lots of Holy Rollers focus on the the down side after all of the drugs got involved. The golden age occurred during the first half of Boogie Nights.

Golden Age – Definition

There were a not insignificant number of people who boldly stated erotic movies would devolve into trash as the price of equipment fell. They were right. Just look at any Internet site that lets user upload content shot with Apple phone.

A large number of actors, writers, and producers went looking for the sweet spot. This lead to the XRCO Adult Film Awards in 1985 and what is now known as the AVN Awards. For those of you who don’t know, the AVN Awards were 30 years old in 2013. This was all part of the attempt to raise the bar. On the Internet you just have porn, usually bad porn. These were attempts at full blown movies with scripts, plots, mystery, eroticism, and everything else every other movie had.

Naturally there were two schools of thought on this.

  • Take a great movie all the way to the edge without actually becoming the legal definition of porn
  • Lift a porn movie all the way up from trash to something that holds your attention even without the sex

Crimes of Passion is from the first school of thought. It went to the edge before you had Fifty Shades of Grey. In this same Golden Age you will find the Kim Basinger/Mickey Rourke film 9 1/2 Weeks. There were quite a few others in this mid-eighties experimental genre. The era kind of came to a close with Theresa Russell’s Whore in 1991. If the producer hadn’t been into vomit scenes Whore would have done way better in the theaters. I’ve often wondered why such a cut didn’t come out in later years.

Crimes of Passion (1985)

In 1985 the theme of “professional woman by day, prostitute (whatever) by night” wasn’t a trope, not yet anyway. Granted the 70s overused the tennis (whatever) pro by day and spy/secret agent/private eye by night storyline but powerful women were largely ignored.

Kathlene Turner totally delivered in this movie. They could not have found a more powerful leading lady. Crimes of Passion came out before Holy Roller cancel culture took power so she was able to follow up a smoking erotic thriller role like this with Prizzi’s Honor and The Jewel of the Nile. Like I said, this era was all about powerful women embracing their sexuality and ruling the screen.

Anthony Perkins is the surprise that seals the deal for this flick. Honestly, to get the full effect of this movie you really need to watch it about three times. Anthony Perkins plays a priest that is stalking China Blue (Kathlene Turner) and quietly chanting outside her window. I guess if you cheat and turn on closed captions you can get what he is chanting in the first pass. It’s kind of the main story of all the stories going on in this film.

Yes, All the stories

There are so many stories going on in this film. Ultimately Kathlene Turner’s daytime character is fleeing humanity. She’s the best at her job and she shuts out all ordinary human interaction. You can decide if she is China Blue for some form of penance or if she can only have human contact as someone else. Ultimately this is a story about finding your way back to humanity by forcing yourself to walk through Hell.

For more movie rental ideas please see list one and list two.