Idiosyncrasies of Alfred Hitchcock - Essay Example

ALFRED HITCHCOCK Introduction Dial M for Murder (1954) is a film produced by Warner Brothers and directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The movie was based on the almost identical stage play of the same title by English playwright Frederick Knott (1916-2002). Almost half a century later when we look back the inescapable feeling is that it is a masterpiece of mystery genre. Articulate in his cinematographic visualization, Hitchcock renders it with more medium specific vitality and verve. Tony Wendice (Ray Milland) is a former tennis player who marries Margot (Grace Kelly) partly for her money. To please his wife, he has given up tennis and now sells sports equipment. Margot once had a relationship with Mark Halliday (Robert Cummings), a crime writer for American TV, but broke it off when Mark went to America. The meticulous planning of his wife's murder invariably brings Tony under the spotlight but does not diminish his stature by one iota for the sole reason that he is not desperately trying as someone in his position should do. Tony's diabolical character and the macabre detail of the film make it not only a three dimensional suspense thriller but also a multidimensional critique of upper echelons of the society. German Expressionism and post-modernism could have influenced Hitchcock to a greater extent because he uses a lot of symbolism and mise-en-scene that borders on imaginative handling of the plot. Mise-en-scene is a production technique that enables the director to achieve some of the mood effects through improvisation. Hitchcock's incredible manner of seamlessly integrating the plot and then resolving it by using that uncannily characteristic deus ex machina in the form an untiring intelligent sleuth is obvious throughout the story. Though a number of films were made in keeping with this novel discovery, none of them could match the 'master effect' of it as "Pandora's Box" did. German Expressionism had a big impact on Hollywood by way of influencing some of the big studios to employ German migrs who were mostly cinematographers and directors fleeing Nazi rule in Germany. Expressionism, particularly, had a positive effect on horror genre and noir genre - both highly receptive to imaginary influences in design and production. Though the very far fetched features associated with this movement, were gradually rejected, the visual aesthetics of it continue to appeal to generations of film-makers till the present day. The plot thickens here with more suspense being added by Margot's susceptibility and naivety. When Margot is alone at home, Swann the hired would-be assassin sneaks in with a key that's been left for him. Tony calls his wife on the telephone, luring her out of the bedroom, and Swann strangles her with a stocking. But Margot buries a pair of scissors in her killer's back. Through some fancy maneuvering, Tony is able to make it appear that his wife acted against a blackmailer in cold blood. She's arrested and sentenced to death, but a police inspector (John Williams) begins to unravel Tony's story. Critics have not spared Hitchcock and his films of their poison pen. We should take a closer look at the Montage technique used in this film. From the 1930s to the 1950s, montage sequences often combined numerous short shots with special optical effects such as fades, dissolves, split screens, double and triple exposures and even music. There were special artistes to assemble these effects other than the director. Hitchcock made use of this technique to achieve a coordinated synthesis between the conveyed impression of a set and the anticipated response of the audience. Critics did not appreciate this technique much. Hitchcock's first American movie, Rebecca (1940), won the Best Picture Academy Award., but in spite of this achievement the critic in "Variety" (March 27, 1940) gave it a bad review. He wrote "Dave Selznick's picture is too tragic and deeply psychological to hit the fancy of wide audience appeal. General audiences will tab it as a long-drawn out drama that could have been told better in less footage." The film was based on Daphne du Maurier's novel, which, in turn, was mostly based on Charlotte Bront's classic "Jane Eyre". In the 1940s Hitchcock also directed some other films "Shadow of Doubt"(1943), which starred Teresa Wright and Joseph Cotton, was a partial success. His "Spellbound" (1945), won an Academy Award for Best Music. "Psycho" was based on Robert Bloch's novel about Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins), proprietor of Norman Bates motel, who keeps the preserved corpse of his mother in his cellar. Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) has stolen $40,000 from her employer and after having driven for almost a day and a half, she decides to stay for the night at the motel. Dressed as an old lady, his mother, Norman kills Marion, when she takes a shower. The scene is among the most famous in film history. Hichcock later told Francois Truffaut that the suddenness of the murder, out of the blue - only one-third of the way through the Bloch novel - did not hold him back from making the film in the first place. The composer Bernard Herrman provided for it an unforgettable score. Norman also kills Milton Arbogast, a private detective, who is on the trail of the money. Marion's sister Lila and Sam Loomis eventually reveal Norman's secret. The film was listed in 1998 as one of the American Film Institute's top 100 films of the century (number 18). Some critics realized that Hitchcock had made a hit, but others not, among them Moira Walsh in America (July 9, 1960): "Hitchcock seems to have been more interested in shocking his audience with the bloodiest bathtub murder in screen history, and in photographing Janet Leigh in various stages of undress, than in observing the ordinary rules of good film construction. This is a dangerous corner for a gifted movie maker to place himself in." A pathetic karmic cycle is woven into the contextual perimeter of the story by Hitchcock as if to avoid the wrath of the audience. While the aspectual thematic paradigm of the story is well controlled with cinematographic hyperbole, the psychological dimension is let loose on the unfolding drama so that the near perfect murder becomes 'something of a mistake'. Hitchcock sought to deliver coup-de-grace with characteristic panache though suspense is more or less stereotypical in nature. Gory scenes of murder and fear psychosis gripping the heart of the audience against the backdrop of the silhouetted assassin are the usual stock-in-trade of the horror genre. Hitchcock surveys the landscape of crime as a precursor to an otherwise morbid outcome. In "Dial M for Murder" he has very rarely moved the camera out of the claustrophobic environment of the apartment where Tony and Margot live. Hitchcock's work has been subject to some of the harshest criticism by his detractors who claim that he has resorted to the same formulaic storyline that has very little else to offer the audience other than "a blas mishmash of crime and detection". He has been found guilty of rechauffe formulas. For instance "Variety"' the film critics' magazine has made the following damning conclusion on the film. " The melodramatics in Frederick Knott's legit hit, Dial M for Murder, have been transferred to the screen virtually intact, but they are not as impressive on film. Dial M remains more of a filmed play than a motion picture, unfortunately revealed as a conversation piece about murder which talks up much more suspense than it actually delivers. The 3-D camera's probing eye also discloses that there's very little that's new in the Knott plotting."( Variety, Posted on January 1, 1954). However he had rich variety and created versatile genres as well. For instance, Hitchcock's Psycho, though tame by modern standards, has done more to propagate the horror genre (slasher films in particular) than any other film of its time; however, the brilliance of Psycho and individual predilections do not lie in its atmosphere of morbidity but rather in the way that Hitchcock synthesizes the obvious and the mysterious. Indeed, in one of the most revealing scenes, just one third of the way through the film, Hitchcock is outrageously obvious in his intentions; yet his artistry in lighting, camera angle, and mise-en-scene make it possible to hide in plain sight and create a world that is rife with duality. This dualism has a conceptual polarity in its metamorphosis. Obviously the primacy and immediacy of Hitchcock's own metamorphosis have been captured in essence here. "Dial M for Murder" is a classical portrayal of his conceptual faculty, notwithstanding the contrariety between justice and contrition. The hypothesis that Hitchcock builds up through his effortless narration is obviously double-edged. On the one hand, it is a syllogism that pervades the reasoning capacity of the audience. On the other hand it is a diabolical mechanism that is indispensible to introverted men like Tony. It is nonetheless the alibi that is so well construed and executed. This mastery of cinematic technique indisputably elevates Hitchcock above a number of his contemporaries. Hitchcock takes us through a labyrinth of gazes, postures and lurid detail that rekindles our atavistic fears. His modus operandi in this particular film is to delay the murder till the end; but then the audience's worst fear is proved to be wrong or again the "deus-ex-machina" comes to resolve it in the way the audience would love to see. A pair of scissors has been thrust into the would-be victim's hands. Incidentally, it was reported that Hitchcock wanted a well shining pair of scissors. Interesting enough, a modern legal witticism offered on Margot's motive, tells us that the murder of Swann was pre-meditated by Margot in the absence of a motive to suspect a stalker. It is a potboiler with a caustic message to the weaker sex. It also drives a wedge between the financial indigence of a parvenu and a wealthy woman. Its narrative technique is rich in point-blank duplicity, albeit a sarcastic one at that too. It is a gradual progression from the would-be victim to the sleuth who unravels the mystery at the end. The audience has a narrator in the form of Leo Britt for guidance but is not effective enough as the sleuth is. Tony is effectively out of his kilter and cannot be trusted by the audience. Margot's now defunct relationship with Mark reechoes throughout the story and its chronological significance- just one year gone by- has the audience wrapped up in a spatiotemporal dilemma. He is now in America. Hitchcock has crafted the narrative technique with minimum emotional investment in a historical paradigm that marred the very transformation process from aristocratic lifestyle of the country gentry to plebian living. It is none too well portrayed in the film than through the penumbral conduct of Tony. The characteristic aplomb with which Hitchcock focuses the camera eye on partially hidden dynamic physical expressions reinforces the very eerie quality of the film. The audience happens to share in the myopic tendencies of a villain, Tony, whose ambivalence about Margot's relationship with Mark persists despite his effort to find a clear motive for murder. Cinematography of Hitchcock is not didactic, nor is it pedagogic. It is a passion for the exposure of prurient proclivities of men who disturb peaceful, innocent and mundane relationships. His inimitable style of cinematic creativity relegates many a director to an insignificant corner. A disturbance-ridden childhood that Hitchcock had, couldn't be more helpful than this. The choice of the medium is inevitably strong. What else could do it better to bring forth the connotations and denotations of complex human relations. Hitchcock rejuvenates the cinematic medium to achieve some cloistered virtues. It is his independent stance along with perspicacious observations that produce the otherwise fairy tale-like final outcome. His eye for detail and the sharp judgmental acumen combined with cinematic grandeur of Technicolor heighten the qualitative drama of the story. Its rapturous end with the villain being pilloried, makes the audience sincerely believe in Providence. Directors like John Huston (The Maltese Falcon), Elia Kazan (Panic in the Streets) and William Friedkin (The French Connection) who were Hitchcock's contemporaries also successfully adapted novels to films. John Huston adapted Dashiell Hammet's book and rendered it more qualitatively acceptable. Frederick Knott's book has received a still greater thrust of critical perception by a master strategist. In the Maltese Falcon (1941), Sam Spade, the private detective, is an embodiment of detachment and uprightness. On the other hand in "Dial M for Murder", the Chief Inspector Hubbard performs his duty with gusto. The Maltese Falcon belongs to the film noir genre and is a direct outcome of post-modernist influence. John Huston was an iconoclastic rebel with a cause and he belonged to the French New Wave. Hitchcock on the other hand did not have theoretical moorings or underpinnings for his films. Hitchcock's heroines are demure socialites with little or no suspicion. Huston's heroines, on the other hand are ignominiously treated because they have 'unjust desires'. Huston's Brigid O'Shaughnessy is a femme fatale with a murderous instinct of her own. Hitchcock elevates Margot to a puritanical level. Detective genre at times produces hilarious innuendo too. Huston's three male villains in the Maltese Falcon- Joel Cairo, Wilmer Cook and Gutman- have homosexual tendencies in varying degrees. Had Huston directed the film in modern times, he could have been hauled before a court of law for being explicitly contemptuous of people's sexuality Hitchcock remains faithful to the basic content of the book but uses a variety of hidden interpretations to achieve that symbolic success in portraying Margot and her world in a different light. There is a streak of light that runs through the space-restricted environment in the film. This quality is particularly attributable to Hitchcock as a screenwriter. His deviations are negligible and pardonable while his faithful adherence to the tenor of the story is vividly sealed onto the larger canvas of the film. The smooth sailing in character development is praise-worthy and the same process can be seen in his technical detail. For instance Margot's dresses are very bright at the beginning of the story while as it progresses she wears very dark colors. Conclusion Hitchcock's idiosyncrasies are abundant though they may not be so obvious to the casual viewer. For instance he does not allow abhorrence of Tony's character to be complete by the audience. It is a partial dislike that pervades the atmosphere till the end. The pivotal point of the plot is the latchkey. It is the clue that almost literally unlocks the mystery. There is a modern remake of this movie called "A Perfect Murder" (1998), starring Michael Douglas and Gwyneth Paltrow in which a similar latchkey technique is utilized. One might be pardoned for entertaining the thought Grace Kelly (Margot) is really a princess with the self-same level of dignified outlook. After all she married Prince Rainier of Monaco when she was reigning supreme at Hollywood. Does Hitchcock hint at cuckoldry Probably no, because his villain wants to have both the worlds. If Tony were a cuckold, the "latchkey" logic would be missing. It is here that Hitchcock, the master of intrigue, brings about the equilibrium that is needed to apportion the blame evenly. It is this balancing technique that partially endears Tony to the audience. The ironic twist comes from the shared intelligence of the audience and the supposed ignorance of Margot. Hitchcock plays on the psychological plane of drama in real life. Tony's guileful conduct needs a strategic medium to express itself through. However, a theoretically coherent body of literature on the subject did not appear till the post-modernist literature focused our attention on the concepts of medium specificity and history stretching (Hutcheon, 2006, p.22). Hitchcock's success depends on medium specific interpolations and elisions that cannot be avoided when adapting a play or a novel into a film script. "Dial M for Murder" shares many angles and aspects with "Rope" (1948). Both films are based on successful plays; they are also about committing the perfect murder and queer enough, they are both experiments. While Rope was conceived as a movie in one take, "Dial M for Murder" was done as a 3-D movie. Pathetic enough, this was a time when interest in 3-D was waning and as such when the film was released, only a handful of cinema owners screened the movie. Hitchcock used the 3-D technique in order to magnify the claustrophobic quality of the Wendices' apartment. However, film-goers of this era were not in a mood to tolerate shock therapy administered by a full-length detective film. According to them it was a gimmick of an altogether different nature. REFERENCES 1. Hutcheon, Linda (2006), A Theory of Adaptation, New York, Routledge Publishers. 2. Variety (January 1954), Dial M for Murder, Retrieved on June 25, 2008 from www.imdb.com/title/tt0046912/externalreviews Read More