To Die For (1995)

User Rating:

6.8/10   

Director:

Gus Van Sant

Writers (WGA):

Joyce Maynard (book)
Buck Henry (screenplay)

Release Date:

6 October 1995 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Crime | Thriller

Tagline:

All she wanted was a little attention.

Plot:

Suzanne Stone is an aspiring TV personality who will do anything to be in the spotlight- including enlisting 3 teenagers to kill her husband.

Plot Keywords:

Television | Panties Hit The Floor | Hitman | Italian Restaurant | Teen Angst

Awards:

Won Golden Globe. Another 6 wins & 9 nominations

Cast

Nicole Kidman	...	Suzanne Stone Maretto
Matt Dillon	...	Larry Maretto
Joaquin Phoenix	...	Jimmy Emmett
Casey Affleck	...	Russel Hines
Illeana Douglas	...	Janice Maretto
Alison Folland	...	Lydia Mertz
Dan Hedaya	...	Joe Maretto
Wayne Knight	...	Ed Grant
Kurtwood Smith	...	Earl Stone
Holland Taylor	...	Carol Stone
Susan Traylor	...	Faye Stone
Maria Tucci	...	Angela Maretto
Tim Hopper	...	Mike Warden
Michael Rispoli	...	Ben DeLuca
Buck Henry	...	Mr. H. Finlaysson

MPAA:

Rated R for strong sexual content, and for language.

Runtime:

106 min | Argentina:110 min

Country:

UK | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR | SDDS

Certification:

Iceland:12 | South Korea:18 | Philippines:R-18 | Argentina:16 | Australia:MA | Finland:K-15 (DVD rating) | Finland:K-16 (original rating) | Germany:12 | Peru:14 | Portugal:M/16 | Singapore:M18 | Spain:13 | Sweden:15 | UK:15 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Brampton, Ontario, Canada

Company:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

The story is set in New Hampshire, but filming took place almost entirely in and around Toronto. Torontonian director David Cronenberg appears in a cameo ("man at the lake").

Goofs:

Continuity: When Larry and Suzanne are in Miami on their honeymoon they are enjoying a warm, sunny day and Larry is in a colorful tropical shirt. But his breath is clearly visible when he speaks.

Quotes:

Suzanne Stone Maretto: You know Mr. Gorbachev, the guy that ran Russia for so long? I am a firm believer that he would still be in power today if he had had that ugly purple thing taken off his head.

Movie Connections:

References Sleeping Beauty (1959)

Soundtrack:

LIVE IT COOL

This one will stay with you a little bit

Clever story with more depth that appears at first blush, directed with irony and a sardonic sense of humor by Gus Van Sant. Nicole Kidman plays an especially shallow TV weather person who gets some grunge kids to kill her husband for her. Her motive is, as Illeana Douglas, who plays the sister-in-law, says, "he got in her way." This is a nice study of narcissism metastasized into psychopathology. She is headstrong, motivated and rather stupid. She thinks only of herself and would do anything for herself and would do anything to anybody who got in her way. And amazingly, she does.

Matt Dillon is wasted as the husband (in more ways than one). I'm surprised he agreed to do the part. Kidman is mesmerizing and makes us believe in a slightly unbelievable character. We've all known narcissistic little darlings who would kill you for the right shade of eye shadow, but to see it acted out so coldly and with such appalling stupidity, yet with a psychology so bizarre that it has to be real, fairly takes your breath away. It was especially apt that she had him killed so that her pointless little docu-drama "Teens Speak Out" could become newsworthy enough for national exposure. Consicously she doesn't realize this: she has no introspection; she just acts.

Also cute is the way the picture is framed: a pseudo-documentary within a pseudo-documentary. Everything is so well orchestrated that when Kidman gets her surprising, but entirely appropriate comeuppance at the end, we are quite pleased.