Hitchcock Page 2

Quote: Aaron @ January 21, 2008, 10:58 AM

Sounds like typical media-lecturer bollocks. My girlfriend was told that - and then had to write an essay about - the carving of ivory boxes in Now, Voyager represents female masturbation. No. It represents carving a f**king ivory box. >_<

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I once made the mistake of telling a lecturer that a painting of a monk by the sea was just a painting of a monk by the sea rather than an exploration of the Nineteenth Century Romantic Sublime. I was quickly pelted with thick academic tomes and ink wells etc. and forced to stand in the corner. You'll learn Aaron...

Incidentally, Hitchcock was way ahead of the game and the studios and he sprinkled his films with subtle gags - usually prurient ones. A well known one is the shot of the train going into the tunnel at the end of North by Northwest, which comes just after Cary Grant has pulled Eva Marie Saint up onto his bunk.

The title of the birds is also a joke - since it references a slang word for women, although to be honest, it's hard to see what else the film could have been called...

Quote: Aaron @ January 17, 2008, 2:02 PM

I thought that this thread was 'Hancock' for a minute. Disappointed.

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Me too.

I think it's something to do with adjusting your manhood.

Quote: Griff @ January 21, 2008, 7:17 PM

Gulls Just Wanna Have Fun

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Well done for not trying to make anything with tits as well.

Quote: Griff @ January 21, 2008, 7:17 PM

Gulls Just Wanna Have Fun

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There's a season of Hitchcock films on TCM (Sky 315, Virgin 415/416) this week. Including the likes of Rope, Psycho, The Man who knew too Much, Strangers on a Train, Rear Window & Vertigo

Birds was on the TV here last week.I find it a bit boring to be honest.
Shadow of a Doubt would be my favourite,possibly because it doesn't seem to be shown as often as the others.

Shadow of a Doubt was his favourite, it's the best scripted Hitchcock imo, with great lines like "Rip the front off houses and you'll find swine." Joseph Cotton was very creepy in it, superb performance. Very nearly my favourite but I'd have to give it to Rear Window for its take on obsessive voyeurism, waffle waffle. Rarely has a movie been so watchable and who wouldn't want to give Grace Kelly one? Strangers on a Train also creepy with his best arty photography imo. Vertigo is mesmerising and is his official masterpiece now, at least with pretentious film studies lecturers.

Looking at IMDB,what surprises me is the chronological order of some of his films.eg: North by Northwest,and Rear Window I thought were some of his later films.And Psycho,one of his earliest.

I'm guessing that's because you'd generally expect the b&w film to be made before the colour films? That's always interested me why that used to happen a lot and as far as I can gather it's all to do with the producers and/or the studio making it at the time. I think it's only later when colour film processing became cheaper and universal that you got directors wanting to use b&w for arty reasons, although Strangers on a Train is fabulously arty in b&w, stunning photography and all the better for being in monochrome (pretentious use of words intended, movies ain't it.)

Another really good b&w Hitchcock that goes under the radar a lot is Suspicion, well worth a watch, highly recommend it.

Yes,could be that.My favourite non Hitchcock film is The Third Man.Set in an atmospheric post war Vienna.I don't think that would work in colour at all.
Suspicion,that's the famous glass of milk one,isn't it ?

Let's face it Hitchcock was the master of suspense, thrills and the macabre - one has only to remember the scissors slowly going into the back as the victim's body fell back to the floor in Dial M For Murder - that still make me feel queasy.

And in a similar vein he was doing this many, many years before anyone else with the early "Blackmail" in 1929. Originally a silent film and then to be claimed as the first British talkie, which is explained here from IMDb :-

" Much of this movie was originally shot silently. When sound became available during the course of shooting, Director Sir Alfred Hitchcock re-shot certain scenes with sound, thus making it his first talkie. There was one complication with this change, however. Leading lady Anny Ondra had a thick Czech accent which was inappropriate to her character, Alice White. Joan Barry was chosen to provide a different voice for her, but post-production dubbing technology did not exist then. The solution was for Barry to stand just out of shot and read Alice's lines into a microphone as Ondra mouthed them in front of the camera. This is generally acknowledged as the first instance of one actress' voice being dubbed by another, even though the word "dub" is technologically inappropriate in this case."

And this is Hitchcock with Miss Ondra in rather naughty vein about her accent :-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Z8mSwzSQQk

I did watch this film many years ago and the one scene that stood out for me, and is Hitchcock exploiting the new sound system, with the famous "knife" scene - I think it's brilliant.................

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvlyQaJbJgs

The film:-

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0019702/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1

Recently watched frenzy for the first time a great film.read up about it afterwards and found out that one the reasons he made the film because he wanted to capture the area before it was redeveloped as his dad worked in the market.

I really like Strangers On A Train, North By Northwest, Dial M For Murder, Rear Window, Shadow of a Doubt. Like all his films. Find Psycho disturbing and Rope and Frenzy but they are still very good. Once did a Film Studies course essay on the Birds which was interesting to write. Very different to Du Maurier's short story. However, the Birds can drag slightly and has an unsatisfactory ending for me.