Double Exposure: Sleazy 1983 giallo thriller comes to Blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome
Actor James Stacy‘s tale is one of Hollywood’s saddest. The handsome character performer was a rising star in the 1960s, a magnet for the ladies and a lad who liked to live on the edge. After a brutal motorcycle accident left him a double amputee, losing both his right arm and leg, Stacy’s career and life seemed to be teetering on the edge of extinction, but after a Hollywood benefit gala raised an exorbitant amount of money to cover his rehabilitation and keep him financially comfortable, he bounced back. Nominated for an Emmy for his portrayal of a war vet in the 1977 TV move Just a Little Inconvenience and landing roles in high profile films and television shows (including a memorable turn in the 1983 Ray Bradbury adaptation Something Wicked This Way Comes), Stacy had carved out a unique place for himself professionally. Personally, however, he was falling apart. Slave to alcohol addiction and other vice, he was convicted of child molestation and sent to prison briefly before failing to attempt suicide and eventually dying penniless and depressed at the age of 79 in 2016. A tragedy no matter how you slice it.
In the middle of Stacy’s quasi-comeback period, he appeared in writer/director William Byron Hillman’s obscure but rather brilliant little 1983 sleazeball American giallo thriller Double Exposure, a semi-prequel to Hillman’s considerably lighter in tone 1974 psychotronic favorite The Photographer. In it, Stacy plays a hard-living stunt driver in a role that was tailored to him, a man who has endured a disfiguring accident and lost his family and now lives on the edge, drinking, driving and womanizing. He is enabled/supported by his hotshot shutterbug brother Adrian (Michael Callan), the same character from The Photographer, who spends his days shooting beautiful models and his nights tormented by nightmares where he’s a black-gloved killer murdering those very same models. And when he wakes up, they really are dead. Is Adrian losing his mind or is something more sinister afoot?
Kudos to Vinegar Syndrome for resurrecting this barely-seen, early ’80s VHS rental opus and giving it a proper showcase, a 2K scan from the original 35mm camera negative. Double Exposure is a wonder, a weird, skeezy, sex-filled and meandering thriller that betrays Hollywood conventions and plays more like a European film, with focus directed more towards Callan’s psychosis, dollops of graphic violence and nudity and a fixation on the day to day dealings with the world around him and, especially his brother. The scenes between Callan and Stacy are marvelous. The two men look alike and share an easy, semi-improvised chemistry that make it absolutely believable that they are brothers. Stacy is so handsome and so charismatic that any physical limitations he might have are a footnote to his performance. He’s really good and so is this kinky, trashy and clever little film.
The Blu-ray comes packed with an array of extras, including an odd commentary track with Hillman and a phoned-in, unnamed moderator, an interview with the cinematographer, Jack Gogan’s amazing isolated score and more. Playing like a TV movie made by Dario Argento, Double Exposure is well worth seeking out.
