Kiss of Death (1995)

Dir. Barbet Schroeder. 1995, 100 mins. 35mm. With David Caruso, Nicolas Cage, Samuel L. Jackson, Helen Hunt, Michael Rapaport, Stanley Tucci, Ving Rhames, Philip Baker Hall. Schroeder’s remake of Henry Hathaway’s gritty crime classic is somehow both grimmer and sillier, one of the more fascinating genre films of the 1990s. Caruso, at the height of his NYPD Blue fame, stars as Jimmy Kilmartin, an ex-con who’s compelled by unscrupulous lawmen to infiltrate his own corrupt syndicate, putting his family in peril and himself in the crosshairs of the coked-up psycho Little Junior Brown (Cage, of course). Filmed all over Queens and featuring seemingly every character actor of the era, the coolly received Kiss of Death helped to sink Caruso’s Hollywood aspirations (along with the Jade from the same year), while Cage’s career was about to skyrocket thanks to his Oscar-winning turn in Leaving Las Vegas. 

Tickets: $15 / $11 senior and students / $9 youth (ages 3–17) / discounted for MoMI members ($7–$11). Order tickets. Please pick up tickets at the Museum’s admissions desk upon arrival. All seating is general admission. Review safety protocols before your visit.