On Hitchcock

Lucy Ellmann may be an accomplished postmodern fiction writer, but her comments about how Alfred Hitchcock "tormented his leading ladies" (New York Times 12/19) repeats an erroneous slander.

Not that the famous director's behavior was always proper (he loved naughty jokes and foolish pranks). Nor can someone like me, familiar mainly with Patrick McGilligan's 850-page authoritative biography of Hitch and other sources, and having never known the subject, weigh in definitively on a complex topic.  

Hitchcock was a loner, an observer of life, a reserved person with an image of himself as ugly. He feared women, as many men do, and often treated them with jokes to relax them or with hovering attention to bring out the feelings needed for their characters. 

All that I've read about his relationship with Grace Kelly and Ingrid Bergman, both life-long friends, and knowing how Janet Leigh, Eva Marie Saint, and other actresses appreciated his direction,  it seems that Hitch's method was often to treat an inexperienced actress (Kim Novak, Tippi Hedren, Joan Fontaine) with a kind of obsessive attention, intended to create anxiety or hysteria in their characters.  Some took offense;  Marlene Dietrich called him a "strange little man."

Grace Kelly, responding to the idea of Hitchcock as a tyrant with actors, wrote that the director was skillful in getting exactly what he wanted out them, often with humor; she recalled the confidence she felt as an actor because of his presence.

I thought of all this as I watched "Notorious" (1946) again, noticing how Hitch's camera perfectly captures the warm sensuality of Ingrid Bergman, especially in her relationship with the cool, aloof Cary Grant as a CIA agent.  And I agree with the assessment of McGilligan that Hitchcock is not just a master of suspense but of ambivalent feelings. He knew exactly how to manipulate the viewer, using tension and humor.  And romance.   The Grant-Bergman relationship indicates how important the main characters' feelings are to the success of the film and how the trivial plot of Nazis in Argentina with a secret wine cellar means little in comparison with the emotional complexity of the lovers.

I've always admired the careful attention to detail that mark a Hitchcock movie.  Everything was planned in advance, and he was in total control of the script, the camera, the lighting and costuming, even the publicity in many cases. He was the total artist who knew that Cary Grant could suggest sexual ambivalence, and Farley Granger in "Strangers on a Train" had a soft masculinity and vulnerability that make him an easy prey for the wiles of the "gay" Bruno.

These are two of my favorites in the Hitchcock canon. I can watch them, along with "Rear Window," over and over, as well as "Psycho."  But I don't share the critical view that "Vertigo" is his greatest achievement: both the story and the acting of Kim Novak are implausible.   And for sheer pleasure, there's "To Catch a Thief," with Grace and Cary on the Riviera in all their elegance, a reminder that romantic comedy, not violence, is Hitchcock's great forte.

Hitchcock and Halloween

I have never really liked outdoor decorations celebrating Halloween, but one display in my neighborhood recently caught my eye because it was clever:  Three skeletons with hard hats and shovels in their hands were digging, so to speak; and the display said to me "Skeleton Crew."

This visual pun would have amused Alfred Hitchcock, about whom I've been reading lately.  He was a complicated man with a controversial reputation despite his stellar career as one of our greatest filmmakers.

I have always been attracted to Hitch, as he was called, because of his wry, deadpan, often irreverent humor.  Watching again his TV shows from the 1955-65 period, I am struck by his understated wit and gift for silliness.   His comic introductions to these often masterful short tales of murder and mayhem turn them into original entertainments. It's as if he winds us up with a bit of suspense, then releases us from the tension.

When asked why he never made comedies, he replied, "Why, all of my movies are comedies."

Hitch's best movies--which for me include Psycho, Notorious, North by Northwest, Strangers on a Train, and Rear Window (but not Vertigo)--show his talent for combining the macabre with a Halloween-like trick, as if to tell the viewer that the crime and madness is, after all, a bit of a joke--sadistic perhaps but nonetheless an experience akin to riding on a roller coaster, where people enjoy screaming in terror because at some level they know they're at an amusement park.

Hitchcock's combination of romantic comedy with the thriller is a hallmark of his 50-plus movies, or at least the best of them, and highlight his delight in ambivalence, that sense of uncertainty that he instills in his audiences. The worst of his films, like "The Paradine Case," lack the quality that makes his 1946 classic "Notorious" such a pleasure to watch as Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant carry on under the watchful gaze of ex-Nazis in Argentina--and of the viewer, who is, as always, turned into a voyeur of sorts.

But if you want to celebrate Halloween with Hitchcock, why not see "Psycho" again and enjoy being tricked? Or at least watch Mrs. Danvers in "Rebecca."

Understanding Hitchcock

Much of this month has been an enjoyable return for me to the world of Alfred Hitchcock.

What began this phase was seeing the 1946 classic "Notorious" again and listening to a commentary that explained the director's unique style, the way he turns an ordinary thing like a key into a bit of poetic cinema.   Here the combination of Cary Grant--elusive, attractive yet ambivalent--and the sensuous Ingrid Bergman and the way they interact is nothing short of perfection.  These two actors capture much of Hitchcock's own ambivalence toward women and sexuality.

I then ordered from Netflix the "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" TV series from the 1950s, which I dimly remember as weird and droll; I now find them little gems of writing, casting and acting, full of irony and that dash of black comedy that makes the work of Hitch so memorable.

I then found the 850-page biography by Patrick McGilligan a treasure of information on the way each film was made and, here and there, insights into the complex character of the Master of Suspense, who, the author notes, is much more than this: he is a master of style and of romantic comedy who deftly handled the censorship in effect in those days with great panache and a clear sense of control.

I admire Hitchcock the filmmaker for his thorough, detailed preparation of each script, his attention to details, including the hairstyle and costume of his female stars, his tact in dealing with actors and his overall wit and charm, even though his practical jokes could be bizarre and off-putting. 

I remain fascinated by how this shy, fat boy who always considered himself ugly made the most of his outsider status: he became the master observer, obsessed with visual space and film as an art form, even though his mind was on entertaining an audience.  Fear, of course, is what he has projected onto his millions of viewers, a fear that was heightened by a World War I bombing of London when he was 15 (more significant, apparently, than his Jesuit teachers or being sent to jail for a short time as a boy, a story he changed and exaggerated over the years).   Always shy, he came to love gossip and parties, and developed a comic persona that transcended the real loner and outsider.

McGilligan gives a detailed look at the preparation for the filming of "Psycho," which, along with the TV show, made Hitch a world-wide celebrity; he also gives attention to the other classics I love to watch again and again: especially "Rear Window," "Strangers on a Train," and "Rebecca" (because of Mrs. Danvers). I am still not as impressed with "Vertigo" as most critics seem to be, mainly because Kim Novak's character is not convincing.  She had trouble with Hitch, who adored Grace Kelly and never got over her marriage to the prince. He mistreated Tippi Hedren but in general behaved well with women, remaining faithful in his strange way to his beloved partner, Alma.

His psycho-sexual fantasy life, however, is another story, and the films that reflect his inner life are intriguing; maybe that's why "Psycho" remains at the top of my list of Hitchcock favorites.  Of his fifty major motion pictures, none won major awards, but a half-dozen are now recognized as major achievements in style.  I will always be grateful that he was able to overcome his shyness and become a great director, in part by his clever handling of producers and by his insistence on displaying his droll, understated wit while dealing with murder and mayhem.

The more I appreciate his films, the more I doubt if I will ever understand the man who made them. No doubt that would have pleased him.

On Hitchcock

"I am never satisfied with the ordinary," Alfred Hitchcock said in his famous interview with Francois Truffaut in 1962.  This desire to be innovative in his cinematic style is one of the things that the French filmmakers of the Sixties admired and why they elevated the Anglo-American director to the pantheon of artists, not mere entertainers.

To be sure, several of Hitchcock's Hollywood features are mediocre or uneven; watching his final movie, "Family Plot," recently was a chore since neither the characters nor the plot had much appeal. I saw few signs of what I most value in the master of suspense: wit and the sense of having our leg pulled by a naughty, clever director.

It's the wit and ingenuity in "Strangers on a Train" or "Rear Window" that, along with tight editing and a striving for perfection in each scene, make these films among his best, along with "Psycho," "Notorious," and "Rebecca."  Also great are "North by Northwest" and "Vertigo," but here the characterization, often a weak spot in Hitchcock, along with the overly complex psychodrama involved, make it one of my least favorites.

Watching the DVD "Hitchcock/Truffaut" I was struck by how much more of an artist he was than "the master of suspense."  He exploited fears masterfully in images that, with painstaking precision, are memorable and original.  He mentioned the sad loss of silent films since, for him, the image is paramount, the dialogue quite secondary.  Some humor and motivation would be lost if his films were shown with music and no other sound, but they would remain great.

I watch my top "Hitch" favorites at least once a year and never tire of them. I can't say that for the work of other directors, and I believe, if Truffaut had not emerge to canonize Alfred Hitchcock as an "auteur" and master craftsman, others would have done so.