Product Details

• Actors: Matt Dillon, Sean Young, James Bonfanti, Sarah Keller, Martha Gehman
• Directors: James Dearden
• Writers: Ira Levin
• Producers: Eric Fellner
• Format: Color, NTSC
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Universal Pictures
• VHS Release Date: May 16, 1996
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6304108850
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #585,397 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A thriller, not a great one, but a thriller nonetheless, July 16, 2007

By 

Larry VanDeSande - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: A Kiss Before Dying (DVD)

This is the type of movie that separates me from most movie critics. They said this was awful, poorly directed, incompetently acted, foolishly presented and an insult to the 1956 original and book. One critic went so far as to say Sean Young played two roles (twins) which gave her the opportunity to play two roles poorly.

I don't argue with any of that. My wife guessed one of the principal clues about 5 mintues into the movie. However, I have to say this movie was interesting from the opening scene and it kept me and my wife involved throughout. It may have been bad but it was effective. It had great studio values and the overly dramatic musical score gave some scenes an affect they didn't have otherwise. Its violent scenes had more of a surreal-life 1970s aura than the cliinically, computer graphic displayed overlay of a 1990s movie. It is also the first film I've ever seen where a train runs over someone (not too graphically).

If you haven't seen "A Kiss Before Dying", the story involves a disturbed young man (Matt Dillon) who romances one sister, then her twin, (and kills a few people in the process) to gain access to her rich dad's wealth. It's taken from a popular 1950s book by Ira Levin and this is the second film treatment, the first coming in 1956 with then-young Robert Wagner in the role of the psycho.

Critics everywhere lamabasted this film as being inane, overdone, sophomoric and so excessively violent it bordered on exploitation. All I can say about that is I tried to watch "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" the night before and was so bored by the silly thing I turned it off after a half-hour. Meanwhile, I stood attentive to "A Kiss Before Dying" to the bitter end, which I might add introduces questions not resolved during the story.

Maybe this says something about my taste in movies. I'm betting it also says something about the entertainment values in films and I think there's more of it in this one than a lot of people want to admit.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars YOUNG AND FOOLISH, March 25, 2005

By 

Michael Butts (Berkeley Springs, WV USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: A Kiss Before Dying (DVD)

Sean Young is the main reason this adaptation of the classic novel and 1956 film doesn't come up to snuff. She's a lovely lady, but her performance in this one is so uninspired and apathetic, one cannot feel for her or cheer her on in her quest to find out who murdered her twin sister. The audience knows early on that Matt Dillon is the nasty culprit, a true sociopath who will stop at nothing to get what he wants. A contrived and convoluted script doesn't help either. For instance, after Young finds out who her husband really is, what makes her sure that he killed her sister? And how does Dillon know that Young is at his mother's house? The supporting cast gamely tries, even Diane Ladd as Dillon's mother, and James Russo as a cop turned security guard. But it's all laid out so methodically lame, it just doesn't work out. By the time Dillon gets his just desert, who really cares?

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A great thriller., November 20, 1999

By 

Dickie Greenleaf (São Paulo, Brazil) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Kiss Before Dying [VHS] (VHS Tape)

This movie is a great thriller, in the style of Fatal Atracttion and Single, White, Female. But, it could be a little more like Ira Levin's novel. But Sean Young's death ( In the beggining ) is one of the bests in the genre.