The Naked Kiss (The Criterion Collection)
Until Sam Fuller came along, movies in the 1960s were still  bound by Hollywood's self-imposed and often hypocritical rules of  discretion. The crimes and misdemeanors of lurid pulp fiction remained  on drugstore spin-racks and newsstands, diluted on screen until Fuller,  with his cigar-chomping audacity and confrontational style, liberated  movies from artificial restraint and kicked them into the meaner,  darker, but more honest maturity of the post-Kennedy era.Shock  Corridorannounced Fuller's brazen agenda a year earlier, butThe Naked Kissis even more astonishing because its trashy,  provocative plot dares to find depth and humanity beneath the hardened  shells of corrupted souls.The film begins like no other before it: Kelly (Constance Towers) beats  her pimp with a handbag, grabs the cash he owes her, adjusts her  telltale wig and makeup, and sets out to begin life anew, free from the  shame of prostitution. Two years later she's in Grantville, a typically  Rockwellian slice of Americana, working wonders with disabled kids and  gaining distance from her miserable past. She's even engaged to the  town's most respected citizen, but dark clouds are gathering: a corrupt  cop knows Kelly's hidden secrets; a nearby brothel taints the  community; and a pedophile is lurking in the shadows. Through it all,  Fuller calibratesThe Naked Kisswith such precision that  sentiment and sordidness can run parallel without colliding, shifting  from outrageous vice to shameless tear-jerking with equal facility.  With twisted tricks up his sleeve, Fuller can be accused of tabloid  tackiness, but that would be missing the point: In Fuller's cruel and  ugly world, compassion still finds a way to survive.--Jeff  Shannon