The Honeymoon Killers

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Ken G I'd heard about this movie for decades (since I was a kid) and was always curious about it, so finally decided to watch. Perhaps it's the great passage of time between when it was made and today, but this isn't the most intriguing movie given the subject matter. Chief reasons for my displeasure with THK is stilted, sometimes unrealistic dialogue, poor acting from many of the supporting actors (OK, LoBianco's "Spanish accent" is laughable in some scenes), and some... let's say unusual musical choices under certain scenes. People praise its "documentary" style, but the meticulously arranged camera shots make it seem like anything. I guess I was expecting something a bit more challenging and experimental from a film from that era but I've seen many more 1960s movies that do it better. Rated 2/5 Stars •  Rated 2 out of 5 stars 11/08/22 Full Review dave s Considering the considerable praise that has been heaped upon The Honeymoon Killers over the years, it's shocking how bad the movie turns out to be. Based on actual events, it follows Ray (Tony Lo Bianco) and Martha (Shirley Stoler) as they steamroll their way across the eastern United States, conning and killing women along the way. The whole film feels amateurish, like it was shot by a bunch of high school kids for a media studies project. The acting is uniformly horrible, the dialogue is often embarrassing, the scenarios all seem unlikely, the editing is inconsistent, the direction by one-and-done director Leonard Kastle is bizarre (enough with the extreme close-ups already) and, most notably, the audio is continually tinny and often unintelligible. This is the kind of movie that you want to watch with someone who loves it so they can point out the merits, which they would be hard-pressed to do. Rated 1/5 Stars •  Rated 1 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review joe m Whoa! I didn't see this coming. I went in to watching "The Honeymoon Killers" thinking it was going to be one of those dated 'so bad its good' type films. Well I was very mistaken. This is a completely unexpected journey in to the life of a man Ray Fernandez (LoBianco) preying on vulnerable women through lonely heart ads who then picks as one of his marks a fat, lonely nurse, Martha Beck (Stoler). Well, Martha turns out to not only match Ray in his ability to victimize, she brings turns it up to 11. The film is well suited to being filmed in black and white as it relentlessly spirals to a stunning yet not unexpected denouement. Stoler and LoBianco are both outstanding. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Audience Member Ug! Intersting but very amateurish Rated 2/5 Stars •  Rated 2 out of 5 stars 05/20/21 Full Review Audience Member What if John Waters would have directed In Cold Blood? Perhaps the answer would look something like The Honeymoon Killers. Shirley Stoler exhibits a much more restrained version of the theatrical lunacy Divine would later perfect, and Leonard Kastle's cinéma-vérité approach to exploitation is an ideal setting to showcase the murderously bizarre interplay between Stoler and Tony Lo Bianco's ersatz Latin lover persona. One of the weirdest true crime pictures ever committed to celluloid. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/01/23 Full Review Audience Member Fat nurse Martha Beck is joined into a lonely hearts club by her best friend Bunny. Almost instantly she starts to correspond with a man called Raymond Fernandez. Their correspondence grows more intense with the bond between them being so strong that Martha invites him to her home in Mobile, Alabama. After a night of wild passion he leaves her to go back home but not before he has secured a loan from her. She then receives a letter from Ray breaking up with her which causes Bunny to ring him to say that Martha is suicidal because of this. When Ray is relieved to find out that neither of them have involved the police, he invites Martha to New York to visit him. When she gets there he lets the cat out of the bag- he is a professional hustler who cons lonely women out of their money and moves onto his next target. Martha is so in love with Ray that she stays by his side and even becomes his accomplice as he commits his next crimes. This movie is based on the true life crimes of a couple dubbed The Lonely Hearts Killers with the film using their real names. The film was also originally to be directed by a young director named Martin Scorsese (wonder what happened to him) but he was fired several days into the shoot as he was just taking so much time getting master shots set up whilst not shooting any coverage shots (according to himself. He even went on to say that it wasn't probably for the best for the film that he was fired as the film was made on a low budget and needed to be shot quite quickly). Leonard Kastle stepped into the breach instead and does a phenomenal job. The film looks gorgeous and is framed to perfection. It's almost like any frame from the film could be hung in an art gallery and admired. The monochrome look of the film is also astounding and reminds me (as does the film as a whole) of Brian De Palma's masterpiece Sisters. The cast are exceptional also with Shirley Stoler utterly iconic in her role as Martha and Tony Lo Bianco also iconic and perfect casting as the money-hungry lothario Ray. This movie is on The Criterion Collection as it deserves to be. In fact, when I rewatched the film for this review I was getting strong John Waters' vibes from it. It was almost like a lost Waters film from around the time of Multiple Maniacs (also deservedly on Criterion) and I could imagine either Divine or Edith Massey playing Martha and Tab Hunter playing Ray. Maybe in a parallel universe this movie was made. Apparently Francois Truffaut named this movie was his favourite American film. And if that doesn't act as a high enough recommendation for you to see the film then I don't know what will. Rated 4/5 Stars •  Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/19/23 Full Review Read all reviews

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