Film Extra Illustrated Talk Hitchcock, Vertigo and Auteurism

Film Extra Illustrated Talk Hitchcock, Vertigo and auteurism When the critics of Cahiers du cinéma began to outline their ideas about the director of a ✦ the majority of Hitchcock films (certainly film as its ‘author’ with a ‘personal vision’ they in the sound period) were ‘thrillers’ with chose certain established directors as romance elements – several others were examples. melodramas; ✦ Hitchcock professed his determination to One of the outcomes of the critical debate was make ‘pure cinema’ – the primacy of the recognition that Hollywood directors ‘showing’ rather than relying on dialogue; working within the studio system could still be ✦ Hitchcock’s own biography seemed to seen as creating something ‘personal’. inform his treatment of selected material Directors could bring their own sensibilities to – i.e. his childhood fears, his Catholicism, films they were contractually obliged to his attitudes towards women and ‘deliver’ and personalise them through stylistic sexuality; features and/or by emphasising specific ✦ a background in ‘silent cinema’ and elements of the generic repertoires on which particularly exposure to German they were expecting to draw. Film critics expressionism was evident in his later began to recognise that films were interesting films; because of the individual and collective inputs ✦ Hitchcock ‘personalised’ his films via of creative personnel – i.e. rather than because cameo appearances and through his of the ‘content’ of the film. promotional activities (including his TV series in the 1950s, Alfred Hitchcock The directors whose work was studied because presents); of their skill in developing mise en scène ✦ in relation to Hollywood as a studio elements in their films included Nicholas Ray, system, Hitchcock was in an almost Otto Preminger and, later, Douglas Sirk. These unique position, having arrived in the US directors also tended to work within genres or under contract to the independent with certain kinds of narrative material which producer David O. Selznik and later allowed their personal expression. Alfred operating with a large degree of autonomy Hitchcock did not necessarily develop a and control as head of his own production particular style of mise en scène. Instead it unit on the studio lots of the majors on was his overall approach to creating film short-term contracts. narratives and his development of a form of ‘romance thriller’ that led to the use of These features of Hitchcock’s work make it ‘Hitchcockian’ as an adjective – the ultimate possible to argue strongly for Hitchcock as a accolade for a director with a personal vision. producer-director of ‘personal projects’ during his Hollywood career (less so perhaps in the Hitchcock attracted the attention of three of UK up to 1939). Even so, the auteurist the five major critics-turned-directors at argument is still undermined by the fact that Cahiers. François Truffaut interviewed anything labelled ‘Hitchcockian’ in the films of Hitchcock over several days in 1962 and Alfred Hitchcock must also be considered in published his interview material in 1967. terms of Hitchcock’s regular collaborators Claude Chabrol and Eric Rohmer had already including such influential figures as his wife published a detailed study of ‘the first forty- Alma Reville as script editor, Bernard four films of Alfred Hitchcock’ in 1958 (i.e. up Herrmann as composer, Robert Burks as to and including The Wrong Man in 1957). cinematographer and a number of key actors There are several reasons why Hitchcock so such as Cary Grant and James Stewart. attracted the attention of this trio: Hitchcock’s projects were carefully selected Vertigo !1 but they were often adaptations, so rather closely with Hitchcock) and who had already than originating film narratives, Hitchcock appeared in three earlier Hitchcock could be said to have developed and presented productions, Rope in 1948, Rear Window in them in his own style and with his own highly 1954 and the remake of The Man Who Knew personal vision. Too Much in 1956. Stewart was one of the top male box office stars of the mid 1950s. In Rear Vertigo Window he had been cast opposite Grace Hitchcock’s 1958 release of Vertigo was not at Kelly, Hitchcock’s ideal leading lady. But Kelly first particularly successful and its recent left the film industry after her marriage to promotion to the top of the Sight and Sound’s Prince Rainier of Monaco and Hitchcock was critics’ list is the result of growing interest in searching for a replacement. His chosen the film as an inspiration for artists of various candidate was Vera Miles, who he had cast kinds since the 1990s. opposite Henry Fonda in The Wrong Man (1957). Vertigo is an adaptation of a 1954 novella by two French writers Pierre Boileau and Hitchcock was furious when Miles turned Thomas Narcejac. They were known mainly down the chance to star in Vertigo because of for the novel which was adapted for Les her pregnancy for her third child. Later he diaboliques (France 1955), a successful thriller would ‘punish’ her by offering her the directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot – secondary female role in Psycho behind Janet sometimes called ‘the French Hitchcock’. Leigh. The recent feature Hitchcock (US/UK Clouzot purchased the rights to the novel 2012) dramatises these exchanges between which became Les diaboliques before Hitchcock and Miles. Some commentators Hitchcock could acquire them. This perhaps have used stories like this to begin an explains why Hitchcock turned to the third argument that Vertigo is the ‘most personal’ of book by the pair (who were aware of his Hitchcock’s films. interest). The Hitchcock blonde The novel D'entre les morts (Among the dead) Any quick scan across Hitchcock’s career as a – Hitchcock’s title came to him later – was set director since the early 1930s will quickly in Paris during the early months of the Second throw up the recurring presence of the typical World War but Hitchcock quickly decided to Hitchcock ‘leading lady’. His early favourite shift the location to San Francisco and to was Madeleine Carroll then later Joan rework the story, making significant changes Fontaine and Grace Kelly. After Kelly, Doris to the ending and adding an important Day, Vera Miles, Eva Marie Saint and Janet secondary character. According to Donald Leigh were leads before the final and, some Spoto (1983: 387) Hitchcock’s eventual (third) would argue, problematic casting of Tippi writer Samuel Taylor was instructed not to Hedren in Marnie. Other female stars have read the original novel. Hitchcock had already appeared in Hitchcock’s films, including visualised the set pieces and his interest was in Ingrid Bergman and Marlene Dietrich, but it the two central characters – he just needed the was those who were cast as ‘ice blondes’ who writer to supply dialogue and the vestige of a have attracted most attention. story. One of the writers who has explored The casting of the two leads was crucial and Hitchcock’s ‘Victorian’ attitudes towards men, Hitchcock turned to James Stewart, managed women and sexuality is Paula Marantz Cohen by the agent Lew Wasserman (who worked in her 1995 book Alfred Hitchcock: The Vertigo !2 Legacy of Victorianism. (Hitchcock was This particular analysis may not necessarily be literally a Victorian baby, born in 1899.) shared by audiences of the film but many Cohen suggests that in their different ways the critics have commented on Hitchcock’s casting two films that Hitchcock made in 1956/7 of actors and his presentations of characters marked a transition in his work. The Wrong and gender relationships. His preference was Man (first released in December 1956) is at always for actors who could portray elegant first glance like a neo-realist study of a man women – who he argued could be ‘brought who is falsely accused of a crime. The more he down’ in the narrative, whereas “an actress co-operates with the police, the more deeply without elegance, no matter how competent he seems to be implicated in criminal activity she might be, can never go up the and his family life begins to suffer. In fact, of scale . .” (Gottlieb 95: 1995) course, the film is artfully constructed to give the impression of realism and Cohen argues Similarly the male actors Hitchcock cast that Hitchcock is using this pretence of successfully tended to be those who could realism to disguise the fact that he has convey vulnerability, weakness or changed his representation of the central male bemusement like James Stewart or Cary and female protagonists. Grant. It’s hard to imagine Hitchcock casting John Wayne – but Sean Connery is actually In his films up to this point, Cohen argues that very effective in Marnie (1964). the couple will be seen to draw together. When the man ‘acts’ in the face of adversity the Hitchcock’s attempts to control actors and to woman will respond with a confident gaze/ make them conform to his ideas is another look that ‘saves’ the couple in various different aspect of Vertigo’s production. Kim Novak ways. Cohen calls this the ‘daughter’s effect’ as was, according to Spoto, manipulated by if the relationship was based on a kind of Hitchcock. A play on Hitchcock’s treatment of family love. But this gaze does not materialise Novak can be seen in The Girl, the BBC TV in The Wrong Man and the couple is broken film from 2012 about the making of The Birds up. with Tippi Hedren in 1961. Hedren is shown in a first meeting with Hitchcock much as Spoto Vertigo is a film that appears to be the direct describes the first meeting with Novak. opposite of The Wrong Man as a dreamlike story about obsession, self-deception and Kim Novak was suggested to Hitchcock by idealised love.

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