The Naked Kiss (1964)

By CinemaSerf

When "Kelly" (Constance Towers) meets "Griff" (Anthony Eisley) on a park bench she is armed with nothing but a smile and a case of champagne. She's a saleswoman for the stuff, don't you know! Suffice to say, the two end up drinking a bit of her stock and this starts the ball rolling on a relationship that is full of ups and downs, pitfalls, betrayal and we even get a song. We learn pretty quickly that "Kelly" is escaping a rather seedy past and that "Griff" isn't all he's cracked up to be either. Soppy melodrama? Well no, actually. The two - and a solid, if unremarkable, supporting cast edge this story forward in quite an innovative, almost exciting, fashion. There is a chemistry between Towers and the rather bland Eisley that keeps this bubbling along as they constantly try to out-manoeuvre one another. Might they even be in love in this epitome of middle-class dullness and double standards that they find themselves living? It doesn't hang around with a solid, sometimes poignantly effective, script and the fact that there isn't an out and out star here helps focus on the performances and the story a bit more. It oozes a sexiness in an understated sort of fashion and though I doubt I will ever watch it again, I did find it (her) quite compelling to watch.