Tag: Alfred Hitchcock

Rapid Response: The Birds

If Hitchcock knew that a group of crows is actually referred to as a murder, do you think that would be enough to attract him to making “The Birds?”

Viewed as his last important and “unflawed” film in his otherwise spotless canon, it is unarguably one of Hitchcock’s most gimmicky pictures, but at times it is also one of the most gruesome and bloody he ever made.

The first stand out segment for me was the gory glimpse of a man with his eye sockets picked out by birds that had attacked his bedroom. Hitch paces this scene brilliantly, starting with Lydia’s (Jessica Tandy) slow walk down an eerily centered corridor and then first giving us a glimpse of a bloody pair of legs on the floor, the pajama pants poked through with tiny beak-shaped holes. Three quick edits that bring us closer and closer to the body confirm our suspicions in the best way possible without allowing it to linger on the shocking image for a second too long.

It’s a good example of how technically perfect “The Birds” is, despite some special effects and puppetry that aren’t quite up to today’s standards. We see his precision in the absolutely gripping finale as the birds attack the Brenner household as well as when Melanie (Tippi Hedren) silently approaches their house to leave young Cathy her present of two lovebirds. Continue reading “Rapid Response: The Birds”

Rapid Response: Spellbound (1945)

Alfred Hitchcock’s “Spellbound” is fairly overacted, but it’s remarkable to look at given Salvador Dali’s famous dream sequence.

Spellbound

I might have thought that an Alfred Hitchcock movie with a psychological twist, Ingrid Bergman, Salvador Dali set pieces and skiing would’ve blown me away, so when I notice how campy, absurd and overacted “Spellbound” is, I may be expected to be frustrated rather than admitting how much fun I had watching the damn thing.

It’s certainly far from a trash, B-movie. It was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director and a handful of other Oscars, and Hitchcock is such a technical perfectionist that it’s impossible not to be entranced in a story even as bananas as this. Continue reading “Rapid Response: Spellbound (1945)”

Rapid Response: Shadow of a Doubt

To say “Shadow of a Doubt” is one of Alfred Hitchcock’s best films is like saying that “Please Please Me” is one of the Beatles best albums. It may not even crack the top 10. And who else can make a movie as good as this one and not have it be in their top 10?

However, this did represent a turning point in Hitch’s already legendary career. “Shadow of a Doubt” was his first wholly “American” film. He made “Rebecca” under the American studio system, but the cast was British and so was the setting. This film starred Teresa Wright and Joseph Cotten in a thriller set in the quaint coastal town of Santa Rosa.

And it says on the special features of the DVD that “Shadow of a Doubt” was in fact Hitch’s favorite film. It seems strange considering how personal “Vertigo” is, or how around the ’40s and ’50s he was considered one of the greatest directors of all time, but not for the American films he was making at the time. His British films like “The 39 Steps” were the ones that resonated with critics so strongly. Continue reading “Rapid Response: Shadow of a Doubt”

Psycho (1960)

If “North By Northwest” has not aged well, it is because Alfred Hitchcock’s large scale, big budget chases are not and were never his strongest suit. Hitchcock made “Psycho” a year later in black and white with a fraction of “North By Northwest’s” budget and no special effects or extravagant chases to think of. Yet “Psycho” has not aged one bit.

“Psycho” is a masterpiece. It is one of the greatest films ever made and beyond that, one of the most influential. I could spend a thousand words discussing the film’s legacy and place in cinema history and never actually talk about the film or the masterful craft that went into it.

But the reason “Psycho” has not aged a day whereas “North by Northwest,” one of his most popular and well known films has, is because “Psycho” is Hitchcock’s expression of “pure cinema,” a term countless critics, and Hitch himself, have thrown around when talking about the film. To make the film, he ditched the crew he used for “Northwest” and enlisted the one that produced his television show “Alfred Hitchcock Presents.” They built the set of the Bates Motel on the still standing soundstage at Universal Studios and did not use any on location shooting. Their budget was a grand total of $800,000. Cary Grant received over $400,000 alone for shooting “North by Northwest.” Continue reading “Psycho (1960)”