She is after a mysterious box that, she believes, has contents worth a fortune. Lily tells Hammer she is in hiding and asks Hammer to protect her. Hammer goes to the apartment of Lily Carver, who says she was Christina's roommate. He decides to investigate Christina's death believing that it "must be connected with something big." He retrieves a book of poetry from the dead woman's apartment and reads aloud several lines from Rosetti's poem, "Remember", as he tries to figure out what that something might be. Hammer comes to in a hospital with Velda hovering over him. The thugs then push Hammer's car off a cliff with Christina's body and an unconscious Hammer inside. Thugs waylay them, and Hammer hears Christina screaming as she is tortured to death. Christina asks him, whatever happens, to "remember me," alluding to a poem by Christina Rossetti. Mike Hammer is a tough private investigator who, with the assistance of his associate and lover Velda, typically works on "penny-ante divorce cases." One evening, Hammer is forced to suddenly stop his sports car by Christina, an escapee from a nearby psychiatric hospital, who is running barefoot along the road, wearing nothing but a trench coat. In 1999, Kiss Me Deadly was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." The film has been noted as a stylistic precursor to the French New Wave, and has been cited as a major influence on a number of filmmakers, including François Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Alex Cox, and Quentin Tarantino. Despite initial critical disapproval, it is considered one of the most important and influential film noirs of all time. The film received the condemnation of the Kefauver Commission, which accused it of being "designed to ruin young viewers", a verdict that director Aldrich protested. Kiss Me Deadly grossed $726,000 in the United States and $226,000 overseas. Bezzerides, based on the 1952 crime novel Kiss Me, Deadly by Mickey Spillane.
The screenplay was written by Aldrich and A. The film follows a private investigator in Los Angeles who becomes embroiled in a complex mystery after picking up a female hitchhiker. It also features Maxine Cooper and Cloris Leachman appearing in their feature film debuts. Kiss Me Deadly is a 1955 American film noir produced and directed by Robert Aldrich, starring Ralph Meeker, Albert Dekker, Paul Stewart, Juano Hernandez, and Wesley Addy.