Deathtrap (film)

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Deathtrap
original film poster
Directed by	Sidney Lumet
Produced by	Burtt Harris Jay Presson Allen (executive producer)
Written by	Ira Levin (play) Jay Presson Allen (screenplay)
Starring	Michael Caine Christopher Reeve Dyan Cannon
Music by	Johnny Mandel
Cinematography	Andrzej Bartkowiak
Editing by	Jack Fitzstephens
Distributed by	Warner Brothers
Release date(s)	March 19, 1982
Running time	116 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
IMDb profile

Deathtrap is a 1982 thriller film. It is based on Ira Levin's play of the same name.

The cast includes Michael Caine, Christopher Reeve, Dyan Cannon, Irene Worth and Henry Jones. Real-life movie and theatre critics Stewart Klein, Jeffrey Lyons and Joel Siegel have cameo appearances as themselves.

The film's poster includes a rendering of a Rubik's Cube puzzle, which was then at the peak of its popularity.

1 Plot summary
2 Reception
3 DVD release
4 External links

[edit] Plot summary

Sidney Bruhl (Caine) is a playwright who is most famous for his mystery thriller The Murder Game. Following the debut of the latest of a series of flops, he returns to his home in East Hampton and to his wife Myra (Cannon). He tells her that he's received a play called "Deathtrap" from a former student from a playwriting seminar. The play is ready for production and Sidney jokingly suggests that he murder the student and steal the play, a joke that becomes more serious when he learns, after calling the student, that no one else has read the play and no one else has a copy. Sidney invites the student up to Long Island.

The student, Clifford Anderson (Reeve), arrives soon thereafter. Myra, who has a heart condition, becomes more and more agitated as the evening progresses, trying desperately to convince Sidney to work with Clifford on "Deathtrap" and share the revenue. Instead, Sidney attacks Clifford, strangling him with a chain. He forces Myra to help him drag Clifford into the yard to bury him.

Following the burial, the Bruhls get a visit from psychic Helga ten Dorp (Worth), who's staying with the Bruhls' neighbors. Helga wanders around the living room and study, sensing pain and death in various spots and associated with various prop weapons and handcuffs Sidney has displayed on the wall. She warns Sidney about a man in boots who attacks him. As she prepares for bed, Myra initially continues to be horrified, but slowly comes to see something of glamour in Sidney's act. Suddenly, Clifford bursts through the bedroom window and beats Sidney with a log. Myra flees and Clifford chases after her until her heart gives out; she collapses and dies. Sidney comes up next to Clifford. They kiss, revealing that they have become lovers and planned Myra's murder together.

Over the next several days Myra's funeral is held and Clifford is moved in as Sidney's "secretary". Clifford works on a play which he says is about a welfare office but Sidney is suffering from writer's block. Sidney's lawyer Porter (Jones) comes over to settle some of Myra's affairs and notices Clifford is acting oddly about his manuscript pages. Sidney sends Clifford off on a pretext errand and breaks into his desk to read the manuscript. He is horrified to discover that Clifford is writing the story of their murdering Myra as a play called "Deathtrap". Clifford tries to convince Sidney to work with him on it. Sidney rejects the idea: he wants to be remembered, he says, as the man who wrote The Murder Game, not as "the faggot who knocked off his wife". Eventually, Clifford threatens him: write it with me or I'll write it without you. Reluctantly, Sidney agrees.

A few days later, Helga stops by again, ostensibly to borrow some candles in case the power goes out in a storm that's blowing up. She meets Clifford and, when Sidney returns from a dinner party a few minutes later, warns Sidney that Clifford is the man in boots she saw attacking him. Sidney assures her that he'll be sending Clifford away, and Helga leaves.

Sidney asks Clifford to help him act out some possible bits of business for the play, first by resisting a frontal assault, then by demonstrating how he might wield an axe. Finally, Sidney produces a gun he's secreted for this moment, trains it on Clifford and tearfully explains to him that he cannot allow completion of "Deathtrap" and can only stop him with a bullet. Sidney bids Clifford good-bye and pulls the trigger.

The gun doesn't go off, though, because Clifford has taken the bullets to load a different gun that he has at the ready. Now in control again, Clifford grabs some wrist and leg manacles off the prop wall and makes Sidney chain himself to a chair. Clifford tells him that he's going to pack and, just before leaving, will unlock one of Sidney's cuffs to allow him time to make his escape. Clifford will complete "Deathtrap" and, if anyone asks, he will deny that it's inspired by Sidney's story. As Clifford goes to pack, Sidney slips out of the cuffs (they are trick cuffs formerly owned by Harry Houdini) and grabs a crossbow off the weapon wall. He stalks Clifford and fells him with a crossbow bolt.

There's a body to dispose of now, but the storm hits with full force, knocking out the power. Before Sidney can find a match to light a candle, a fleeting figure scurries through the living room in a flash of lightning. It's Helga, fully aware that she's in mortal danger. Sidney finds a knife, Helga grabs a gun. Clifford regains consciousness and trips Helga. The gun goes flying and a struggle for it ensues that...

...cuts to the same struggle played live by actors before a full house, where "Clifford" stabs "Sidney" and both die, leaving "Helga" victorious. The opening night audience erupts in thunderous applause, and at the back of the house stands Helga (the real Helga), now the author of a hit Broadway play called "Deathtrap".

[edit] Reception

Though the film was widely lauded, Cannon was nominated for the Golden Raspberry Award for "Worst Supporting Actress" for her performance. Mad magazine parodied the film as Deathcrap.

The kissing scene is not in the original play. In his book The Celluloid Closet, gay film historian Vito Russo reports Reeve as saying that the kiss was booed by preview audiences in Denver, Colorado and estimating that a Time magazine report on the incident (which spoiled the plot) cost the film $10 million in ticket sales.