The Sunny Side of Terror: Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo
Even from the get-go, watching one man pursue another across the rooftops of San Francisco, the viewer is filled with a distinct sense of dread. It is remains impossible for much of the experience to pinpoint exactly what stirs up such primal feelings of fear and unease. One is left scrabbling for some solid ground, throughout a parade of potentially paranormal events, death, deception, and intrigue, only to wind up profoundly unsettled and, as some might say, “creeped out.”
Then again, what can one expect when watching a Hitchcock film?
And, of all the Master’s work, few have the power to instill terror and unease so subtly and deftly as Vertigo (1958).
The story follows retired detective John “Scotty” Ferguson, a man struggling to overcome his personal demons and overwhelming acrophobia—fear of heights. He is hired by an old college friend, Gavin Elster, a properly oily Tom Helmore, to investigate the man’s wife. Madeleine Elster (Kim Novak) has been suffering from some severe psychological affliction, strange enough to lead her husband to consider spiritual possession. Ferguson reluctantly agrees, and the viewer is taken along with him as he tails Madeleine and becomes further and further embroiled in a confounding, decades-old mystery.
Just as it is difficult to determine what exactly makes the film so disturbing, it is equally difficult to determine what exactly makes the film so effective.
It has been hailed by critics for nearly 50 years as one of the greatest examples of psychological thriller ever produced, and was nominated for two Oscars. But where lies the secret to film’s eerie presence?
The script, from the novel d’Entre les Morts by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac, adapted to the screen by Alec Coppel and Samuel Taylor, certainly deserves some credit. Nonetheless, storyline aside, the dialogue is not outwardly dynamic or full of tension. Much of it seems more fitting for a romance.
Stewart’s engrossing performance is a key factor. He tightrope-walks above a precipice of madness in his stammering, good-natured, distinctly Jimmy Stewart way, a regular guy, a hometown fella. Only at the film’s climax does he leap from the rope and plunge into insanity.
The film is shot mostly during the day, in an uncharacteristically sunny San Francisco—the usually foggy den of crime noir. Only selective twisting of certain shots, variances in pace and perspective, draw one in to the madness. For most of the film he plays an earnest straight man to Novak’s stunningly unhinged beauty.
And here, I think, we hit on the trick.
It is the combination of mundane and horrifying, of pedestrian and petrifying, that the film finds success.
Under Hitchcock’s gimlet-eyed gaze, the film takes the normal, the everyday, and plunges it into a dark world of obsession and murder.
While much of Hitchcock’s body of work— Psycho, The Birds—transports the viewer to a freakish “other place,” be it deserted motel on some bleak stretch of highway or crumbling sea town infested with an avian menace, Vertigo shows the sunny side of terror, reminding us that our fears aren’t as deeply buried as we hope. It shows us that some monsters don’t need shadows to hide in. They walk along the street with us.
Then again, what can one expect when watching a Hitchcock film?
And, of all the Master’s work, few have the power to instill terror and unease so subtly and deftly as Vertigo (1958).
The story follows retired detective John “Scotty” Ferguson, a man struggling to overcome his personal demons and overwhelming acrophobia—fear of heights. He is hired by an old college friend, Gavin Elster, a properly oily Tom Helmore, to investigate the man’s wife. Madeleine Elster (Kim Novak) has been suffering from some severe psychological affliction, strange enough to lead her husband to consider spiritual possession. Ferguson reluctantly agrees, and the viewer is taken along with him as he tails Madeleine and becomes further and further embroiled in a confounding, decades-old mystery.
Just as it is difficult to determine what exactly makes the film so disturbing, it is equally difficult to determine what exactly makes the film so effective.
It has been hailed by critics for nearly 50 years as one of the greatest examples of psychological thriller ever produced, and was nominated for two Oscars. But where lies the secret to film’s eerie presence?
The script, from the novel d’Entre les Morts by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac, adapted to the screen by Alec Coppel and Samuel Taylor, certainly deserves some credit. Nonetheless, storyline aside, the dialogue is not outwardly dynamic or full of tension. Much of it seems more fitting for a romance.
Stewart’s engrossing performance is a key factor. He tightrope-walks above a precipice of madness in his stammering, good-natured, distinctly Jimmy Stewart way, a regular guy, a hometown fella. Only at the film’s climax does he leap from the rope and plunge into insanity.
The film is shot mostly during the day, in an uncharacteristically sunny San Francisco—the usually foggy den of crime noir. Only selective twisting of certain shots, variances in pace and perspective, draw one in to the madness. For most of the film he plays an earnest straight man to Novak’s stunningly unhinged beauty.
And here, I think, we hit on the trick.
It is the combination of mundane and horrifying, of pedestrian and petrifying, that the film finds success.
Under Hitchcock’s gimlet-eyed gaze, the film takes the normal, the everyday, and plunges it into a dark world of obsession and murder.
While much of Hitchcock’s body of work— Psycho, The Birds—transports the viewer to a freakish “other place,” be it deserted motel on some bleak stretch of highway or crumbling sea town infested with an avian menace, Vertigo shows the sunny side of terror, reminding us that our fears aren’t as deeply buried as we hope. It shows us that some monsters don’t need shadows to hide in. They walk along the street with us.
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