Critical Reception and Legacy (Body Double) Body Double

Body Double lost money against the 1984 blockbuster slate

Body Double was a commercial disappointment:

Metric	Amount
Budget	~$10 million
Domestic gross	~$8.8 million
Opening weekend	~$3.5 million

For context, 1984 was the year of Beverly Hills Cop, Ghostbusters, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, and The Terminator. Body Double was a deliberately provocative art-house thriller competing against blockbusters, and the audience stayed away. (boxofficemojo)

Contemporary critical response was sharply divided

The film holds a 79% on Rotten Tomatoes (based on later aggregation of 29 reviews). Metacritic was not yet operational in 1984. The critical divide was intense and revealing:

Roger Ebert was one of the film's strongest champions, giving it 3.5 out of 4 stars:

"Body Double is an exhilarating exercise in pure filmmaking, a thriller in the Hitchcock tradition in which there's no particular point except that the hero is flawed, weak, and in terrible danger — and we identify with him completely." — Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com (1984)

David Denby in New York magazine praised De Palma's visual style in terms that few other American directors could claim:

De Palma's "gliding, sensual, trancelike style" was "the most sheerly pleasurable achievement in contemporary movies." — David Denby, New York (1984)

Vincent Canby in the New York Times singled out Melanie Griffith's "perfectly controlled comic performance."

Pauline Kael, who had been one of De Palma's most important champions, was disappointed — and her disappointment wounded him:

"If Brian De Palma were a new young director, Body Double would probably be enough to establish him as a talented fellow. But, coming from De Palma, Body Double is an awful disappointment." — Pauline Kael, The New Yorker (1984)

Kael's review was especially pointed about the Hitchcock borrowings:

"The big, showy scenes recall Vertigo and Rear Window so obviously that the movie is like an assault on the people who have put De Palma down for being derivative. This time, he's just about spiting himself and giving them reasons not to like him." — Pauline Kael, The New Yorker (1984)

The Washington Post was blunter, calling the film "creepy crud." Other negative responses focused on misogyny, gratuitous violence, and what critics saw as empty Hitchcock recycling. The drill murder drew particular outrage.

The film stalled De Palma's post-Scarface momentum

Coming after Scarface (1983), Body Double should have confirmed De Palma as a commercial force. Instead, it confirmed critics' view of him as a provocateur who couldn't — or wouldn't — make a crowd-pleasing film. His next project, Wise Guys (1986), was a lightweight comedy that seemed like a deliberate retreat. He didn't fully recover until The Untouchables (1987).

The film's self-reflexivity reads better decades later

Over the decades, Body Double has been steadily reappraised. The reassessment has several sources:

• The self-reflexivity reads better now. In 1984, De Palma's meta-commentary on filmmaking and voyeurism was dismissed as pretension. In the era of post-horror and self-aware genre filmmaking, the same qualities read as ahead of their time.
• The LA specificity. The film is a portrait of mid-1980s Los Angeles — its architecture, its industry, its blend of glamour and sleaze — that becomes more valuable as historical document.
• Melanie Griffith's performance. Holly Body is increasingly recognized as the film's best element — a performance that was undervalued because the character was a porn actress. De Palma himself noted the disconnect between the film's reception and Griffith's work:

"She gave a sensational performance. As much as people disliked the movie, they all liked her." — Brian De Palma, The Frida Cinema (2024)

• Formal appreciation. The long tracking shots, the split-screen work, the elaborate set pieces — these are studied in film schools as examples of De Palma's technique at its most assured.

The Indicator Blu-ray and Sony 4K UHD are the key home releases

Format	Year	Notes
VHS	1985	First home release
Laserdisc	1986
DVD	1999
Blu-ray	2013	Twilight Time limited edition
Blu-ray (Indicator LE)	2016	4K restoration, 1080p; limited to 5,000 copies; out of print
Blu-ray (Indicator SE)	2017	Same 4K restoration; standard edition reissue
4K UHD (Sony SteelBook)	2024	2160p Dolby Vision/HDR10; Dolby Atmos; 40th anniversary edition

The Indicator (Powerhouse Films) Limited Edition Blu-ray (October 2016) presented a 4K restoration at 1080p with original stereo and 5.1 surround audio. Limited to 5,000 copies, it went out of print by September 2017. Powerhouse released a standard edition in October 2017 with the same transfer and extras but without the 40-page booklet. The Indicator editions have the most comprehensive special features, making them a primary source archive for this wiki:

• The Seduction (2002, 17 min) — De Palma discusses the first treatment of the script
• The Setup (2002, 17 min) — examining the plot construction
• The Mystery (2002, 12 min) — Melanie Griffith discusses her nude scenes and De Palma's shyness on set
• The Controversy (2002, 6 min) — cast and crew on the critical reception
• Pure Cinema (2015, 38 min) — extensive interview with first assistant director Joe Napolitano
• Craig Wasson Interview (1984, 8 min) — archival NBC interview by Bobbie Wygant
• Isolated Pino Donaggio (Body Double) score
• 40-page booklet with essay by Ashley Clark (LE only)

(indicator LE, indicator SE)

The Sony 4K UHD SteelBook (September 2024) is the first true 4K disc release, presenting the film in 2160p with Dolby Vision and HDR10. Audio was upgraded to Dolby Atmos (with TrueHD 7.1 core), alongside DTS-HD MA 5.1 and 2.0 tracks. The SteelBook includes the four 2002 featurettes, archival EPK interviews, the Frankie Goes to Hollywood "Relax" music video, a still gallery, and a theatrical trailer — but omits the Indicator-exclusive "Pure Cinema" Napolitano interview, the isolated score, and the Craig Wasson archival interview. (blu-ray.com, highdefdigest)

De Palma was nominated for Worst Director in the same season Griffith won Best Supporting Actress

Body Double received a Golden Raspberry Award nomination for Worst Director (Brian De Palma) at the 5th Golden Raspberry Awards in March 1985. De Palma lost to John Derek (Bolero). The same awards season told a split story: while the Razzies singled out De Palma's direction, the National Society of Film Critics awarded Melanie Griffith Best Supporting Actress for the same film, and she received a Golden Globe nomination in the same category. The Razzies' assessment has aged poorly — De Palma's direction is now the quality most studied and praised. (5th golden raspberry awards — wikipedia, imdb awards, wikipedia)