Sight & Sound...Classic Cinema with Live Music

Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo at Davies Hall, San Francisco, November 1, 2013

A few months ago the San Francisco Symphony announced that it would kick off a season-long classic film series with Hitchcock Week, October 30 - November 2. Each night a different Hitchcock movie was to be presented with its music track scrubbed and the score performed live by the symphony orchestra. Psycho launched the series on the 30th, followed by The Lodger on Halloween, Vertigo on November 1st and, on the 2nd, a night of 'greatest hits' excerpts (To Catch a Thief, Strangers on a Train, Dial M for Murder, North by Northwest) hosted by Eva Marie Saint. Most appealing to me among these events was the Vertigo program, not only because Vertigo is one of my favorite films of all time, but also because the symphony's musical accompaniment would be the world premiere live performance of Bernard Herrmann's full score. But the event was sold out by the time I found out about it. Only due to my good fortune in making a connection with a very considerate symphony representative did a pair of orchestra section seats come my way. And so it was that on the first Friday night in November my dear friend, Mike, and I, filled with anticipation and excitement, set off for Davies Symphony Hall to see Vertigo and hear its luscious score live. Once there, we sampled the special cocktail concocted for the evening, "The Voyeur" (sparkling wine, Grand Marnier, cognac), had a quick bite to eat, took our seats and waited for the lights to dim.

"Voyeur"

The presentation started with an informal talk by Bernard Herrmann biographer Steven Smith, an expert on the composer's music, who contends that "the pairing of a master visualist like Alfred Hitchcock and a composer like Bernard Herrmann, who set out to pull viewers 'into the drama,' remains the greatest director-composer partnership in cinema." Many consider Vertigo's score the ultimate of the composer's seven scores for the director (The Trouble with Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much, The Wrong Man, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, Marnie), and Bernard Herrmann himself acknowledged that the music he composed for Vertigo was his favorite of his Hitchcock works.

James Stewart and Kim Novak, Vertigo

Within Herrmann's heady score is a deliberate nod to composer Richard Wagner, particularly the "Liebestod" from Tristan und Isolde - what biographer Smith refers to as Vertigo's "Wagner-tinged love theme." Wagner described Tristan und Isolde as "a tale of endless yearning, longing, the bliss and wretchedness of love...a yearning, a hunger and anguishing forever renewing itself." I can't think of a better description of Scottie Ferguson's never-ending, obsessive love for Madeleine Elster, so flawlessly accentuated by Bernard Herrmann's heart-piercing theme.

I have seen Vertigo on many screens large and small over the years, from its re-release into theaters in 1983, to countless in-home viewings, to a screening last year at Oakland's movie palace, the Paramount Theatre. As I watched Hitchcock's dreamscape unfold onscreen at Davies Hall and listened to the live performance of Herrmann's score, I thought of Diane Ackerman's poetic Natural History of the Senses and her descriptions of the visual image as a "tripwire for the emotions" and of music that "like pure emotions...frees us from the elaborate nuisance and inaccuracy of words." My experience of Vertigo with orchestra was as profoundly moving as it was unique.

My friend Mike, who was once a sound engineer for CBS Records, remarked that the symphony was so perfectly in synch with the film that he found himself forgetting that an orchestra was onstage performing the score. When he did take a moment to watch the orchestra, he said he noticed that conductor Joshua Gersen was "playing to time," keeping a close eye on a clock as well as the sheet music and musicians.

In 2011 I attended my first film with live accompaniment at the San Francisco Symphony when Casablanca was screened and the orchestra performed Max Steiner's memorable score. It was exhilarating and I hoped there would be more such events to come. When I learned the Symphony had scheduled a film series to run through its entire 2013/2014 concert season I was thrilled. The Hitchcock Week launch was a great success and four more film-with-orchestra events are still ahead. Classic film buffs in or near the San Francisco Bay Area (or who may be headed this way for business or holiday) shouldn't miss the chance to experience an evening of great cinema backed with live orchestral accompaniment  - a pleasure that nearly defies description.

Ingrid Bergman, Humphrey Bogart, Casablanca

Coming to the symphony on Saturday and Sunday, December 6 and 7, is the film classic voted the greatest musical of all time by the American Film Institute. Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly's Singin' in the Rain (1952), featuring Nacio Herb Brown and Arthur Freed's music, will be presented at 7:30 pm both nights. Conductor Sarah Hicks will lead the orchestra.

Gene Kelly, Singin' in the Rain

On Saturday, February 15, Valentine's Day weekend, the symphony will present A Night at the Oscars. The program will begin at 8:00 pm, and conductor Constantine Kitsopoulos and the symphony will accompany excerpts from The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), Gone with the Wind (1939), The Wizard of Oz (1939), Citizen Kane (1941) and Ben-Hur (1959) with the music of Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Max Steiner, Herbert Stothart, Bernard Herrmann and Miklós Rózsa.

Basil Rathbone and Errol Flynn, The Adventures of Robin Hood

Saturday April 12, brings Charlie Chaplin's silent masterpiece, City Lights (1931), to Davies Hall. Conductor Richard Kaufman and the symphony orchestra will perform Chaplin's score, its main theme based on José Padilla's song, "La Violetera."

Charlie Chaplin, City Lights

The season's classic film series will end with Fantasia on Saturday, May 31, at 8:00 pm, and Sunday, June 1, at 4:00 pm. These presentations will feature a mix of elements from Disney's original Fantasia (1940) and Fantasia 2000. Sarah Hicks will conduct the symphony in selections including Stravinsky's Firebird Suite, Debussy's Claire de lune, Beethoven's Pastorale, Dukas' The Sorcerer's Apprentice and more.

Fantasia

For detailed information on the San Francisco Symphony's classic film series and its "Compose Your Own" special pricing package, click here or call (415) 864-6000.
 

Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco

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Three (Mesmerizing) Hitchcock Villains Revisited on Halloween

Today (and today only) our friend Lara of Backlots is hosting a one day Hitchcock Halloween blogathon and for the occasion I'm resurrecting an old favorite from the Reel Life archives.

In January 2011 the Classic Movie Blog Association hosted a Hitchcock blogathon and I decided rather than blog about a particular film, I'd take another approach. The result was an exploration of three legendary Hitchcock killers and the actors who portrayed them: Joseph Cotten's Uncle Charlie in Shadow of a Doubt (1943), Robert Walker's Bruno Anthony in Strangers on a Train (1951) and Anthony Perkins's Norman Bates in Psycho (1960). I was and still am fascinated by the complex characters of Uncle Charlie, Bruno and Norman - and with the masterful performances of the three daring actors who took their turns as what film critic/historian David Thomson calls Hitchcock's "smiling psychopaths."

Click here to read Three Classic Hitchcock Killers.

For links to Lara's blog and and more on Hitchcock Halloween, click here.

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Hitchcock Week...and more...at the San Francisco Symphony

Just over two years ago I attended – and was astounded by - “Casablanca with the San Francisco Symphony” at Davies Hall. Conductor Michael Francis led the orchestra in accompanying the beyond-iconic classic with Max Steiner’s unforgettable score. What an experience it was (click here for my reaction)...

Now the symphony is about to present a Halloween season series, Hitchcock Week, spotlighting several of the Master’s films with live musical accompaniment. The piècede résistance will be “World Premiere: Vertigo” on Friday, November 1, with the symphony accompanying Hitchcock’s great masterpiece with Bernard Herrmann’s brilliant, haunting and, some would say, peerless score.

Bay Area film lovers, get thee to a box office, online or otherwise! Hitchcock Week is about to begin… 

Wednesday, October 30, 8pm, Psycho, with Joshua Gersen conducting Herrmann’s legendary score 

Thursday, October 31, 7:30pm, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, live organ music will accompany Hitchcock’s early silent thriller on Halloween night

Kim Novak and James Stewart, Vertigo (1958)

Friday, November 1, 8pm, Vertigo - Vertigo accompanied by the San Francisco Symphony…what more is there to say? 

Saturday, November 2, 8pm, Hitchcock! Greatest Hits, clips from several Hitchcock classics – To Catch a Thief, Strangers on a Train, Dial M for Murder, North by Northwest – to be hosted by Eva Marie Saint, with Joshua Gersen conducting

Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint in North by Northwest (1959)

The symphony has scheduled more classic films with orchestral accompaniment through the rest of its 2013/2014 season: 

Friday and Saturday, December 6 and 7, 7:30pm, Singin’ in the Rain 

Saturday, February 15, 8pm, A Night at the Oscars will feature celebrated scenes and scores from memorable films 

Saturday, April 12, 8pm, Charlie Chaplin's City Lights 

Saturday, May 31 at 8pm and Sunday, June 1 at 4pm, Fantasia 

A “Compose Your Own Film Series” package offers savings to those who buy tickets to three or more of these film concerts: Click here to go to the symphony website or call (415)864-6000.

Fantasia (1940)

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Hitchcock...in 3D!

My introduction to 3D movies finally came this past weekend and I’m sure it surprises no one who knows me that this happened by way of a classic rather than one of today’s CGI extravaganzas.  My initiation into stereoscopic 3D film, a process that has been around forever but has gained a firm foothold only recently, took place on Sunday afternoon, when I happily watched the only 3D film Alfred Hitchcock ever made with a near-full-house audience at one of my favorite theaters, the Rafael.

The Rafael Theatre, San Rafael, CA

Dial M for Murder (1954) was the last film Hitchcock made as part of his deal with Warner Bros., a studio that had a huge hit with the 3D horror thriller House of Wax in 1953. On the heels of that film’s box office success, Jack Warner decreed, for the moment, that Warners would or should make all subsequent films in 3D. Hitchcock, who was ever interested in evolving filmmaking technology, agreed to make his final film for the studio using 3D. It would be his first and last foray into the process. Because it could not be released until the Broadway play it was adapted from had ended its stage run, Dial M did not come out until mid-1954, just as public fascination with 3D films had begun to wane. In fact, once it went into wide release, the film screened far more often in 2D than 3D. The first “golden age” of 3D film had lasted only from 1952 until 1954; the process was an expensive and unwieldy undertaking at the time, and other, less difficult to produce and exhibit technologies, like CinemaScope, would move to the forefront.

According to AMPAS, “Hitchcock used the All-Media rig developed by the optical department at Warner Bros. to experiment with stereoscopic techniques…” To emphasize the impact of 3D, he paid great attention to the film’s art direction, in particular, set design and decoration, as well as the placement of actors within each scene.  Since the action, based as it was on a play, takes place primarily on one set, a London apartment interior, this sort of approach was a necessity.  Of course, in the hands of an artist of Hitchcock’s caliber, 3D became a showcase not only for the drama at hand but, simultaneously, showcased the process itself. Hitchcock’s distinctive style coupled with the potency of 3D makes for an intense and evocative film experience. All that transpires onscreen - from a woman quietly reading her newspaper to a violent scene of attempted murder - is enhanced by the director's grasp of the 3D format.

Grace Kelly

I have seen Dial M for Murder many times in 2D. I think it may have been the first Hitchcock film I ever saw. There was once a local Los Angeles TV station that aired a different movie every week, all week: in the early evening five nights, Monday through Friday, and then again Saturday night. Was it KTLA? One week the movie was Dial M. And I watched it every night. Hooked by Hitchcock at a young age! But Dial M hasn’t been a favorite of mine. After seeing Vertigo, Rear Window, Notorious, Strangers on a Train, Shadow of a Doubt, Psycho, ETC., it seemed fairly tepid fare. And yet, when I found out it was to be screened at the Rafael, I instantly purchased tickets online. I had realized by now that Hitchcock on the big screen is a different experience from Hitchcock on the small screen (even on a good-sized small screen in HD). This realization first dawned on me when I attended a screening of the silent version of Blackmail (1929) at the Rafael a few years ago and grew more profound with later viewings of North by Northwest (1959), also at the Rafael, and Vertigo (1958), at the Paramount, Oakland’s Art Deco movie palace.

Anthony Dawson and Grace Kelly

I was not disappointed with the newly restored Dial M for Murder in Dolby 3D. At all.  With visual depth and dimension it seemed to me a different film. Where, before, the film had seemed as flat as its two-dimensional format, it now, literally, came to life.  I’d thought of it as talky and static (as filmed plays often are) but now its atmosphere teemed with suspense, every word spoken implied more, facial expressions and physical movements suggested barely concealed undercurrents. Dialogue-heavy as it is, the film now seemed to move along at a brisk clip. Though one scene was obviously designed for 3D (and must’ve caused quite a stir when the film was first shown), Hitchcock clearly understood 3D and exploited it with precision in every frame.

dialing M...

Among Dial M for Murder’s claims to fame is that it was the first of Hitchcock’s three films starring Grace Kelly. He had first seen the young actress opposite Robert Alda in an early ‘50s screen test for Taxi, a film that was never made. She would go on to make High Noon (1952) with Gary Cooper for Fred Zinnemann and Mogambo (1953) with Clark Gable and Ava Gardner for John Ford before Hitchcock managed to cast her in Dial M. If director Gregory Ratoff thought Kelly was perfect for the role of the Irish lass she might have played in Taxi because, he said, “she’s not pretty,” Hitchcock saw something else entirely. By the time the two were finished making pictures together in 1955, Kelly was vaunted as one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood - due in no small part to Hitchcock’s presentation of her.

A scene designed for 3D

Thanks to the resurgence of 3D, Dial M for Murder can now be seen as it was originally conceived and appreciated as the bona fide classic it is.

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Ticket Giveaway: "The Birds" is Coming!

The much-anticipated Turner Classic Movies/NCM Fathom Events presentation of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds screens in theaters nationwide next Wednesday night, September 19, and I'm happy to announce a random drawing for a pair of tickets to the event will be held here at Eve's Reel Life this Sunday, September 16.


Please send your entry, including your name, mailing address (no P.O. boxes, please), and theater selection (I need all three) to ladyevesidwich@gmail.com. The winner will be contacted immediately and tickets will be sent directly from a representative of  NCM Fathom. Click here for a list of participating theaters. Update: On Sept. 16, a winner was selected by random drawing - congratulations to Rebecca in Indiana (and thanks to everyone else who entered the drawing)!

This presentation of Hitchcock's 1963 classic thriller, Oscar-nominated for its special effects, will screen at 7pm local time. Special features include an introduction by TCM's Robert Osborne as well as his interview with the film's leading lady, Tippi Hedren. Co-stars Rod Taylor and Suzanne Pleshette will also share on-the-set stories via archival TCM footage. The film itself has been newly restored by Universal in celebration of its 100th anniversary.

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Five More Film Classics Coming to a Theater Near You

Turner Classic Movies and Fathom Events are about to begin a film series in celebration of Universal's 100th anniversary with special movie theater presentations of four newly restored Universal classics.

On Wednesday, September 19, "The Birds is coming" - again - and Alfred Hitchcock's 1963 thriller will screen in select theaters around the country at 7pm local time. Oscar-nominated for special effects, the film is arguably Hitchcock's last great classic. TCM's Robert Osborne will provide an introduction and present an interview with the film's leading lady, Tippi Hedren, who shares her memories of working with Hitchcock and filming The Birds (1963). Archival TCM footage of Hedren's co-stars Rod Taylor and Suzanne Pleshette are also included.

Next up, in a spectacular lead-in to Halloween, is a double feature on Wednesday, October 24, of two James Whale horror classics, Frankenstein (1931) and The Bride of Frankenstein (1935). Again, TCM's Robert Osborne will introduce the films and will also present interviews from the 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival with Boris Karloff's daughter, Sara, Bela Lugosi's son, Bela, Jr., and Oscar-winning make-up artist Rick Baker. Show time is 7pm local time.

  
On Thursday, November 15, TCM, Fathom and Universal will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the heartwarming and thought-provoking To Kill a Mockingbird (1962), a powerful drama nominated for eight Academy Awards and winner of three. Directed by Robert Mulligan and based on Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize winning novel, the film stars Gregory Peck in an iconic Oscar-winning performance and features future Oscar-winner Robert Duvall in his first credited screen role. Included in the presentation is an introduction by TCM's Ben Mankiewicz who will share archival interviews with many who took part in the production. Screening of To Kill a Mockingbird begins at 7pm local time.

 

In addition, Fathom Events is partnering with Sony Pictures Entertainment to bring Lawrence of Arabia 50th Anniversary Event: Digitally Restored to the big screen on Thursday, October 4. Nominated for ten Academy Awards and winner of seven including Best Picture, the film was directed by David Lean and stars Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif. Special features include introduction of the film by the Oscar-nominated Sharif, newsreel footage of the film's original New York premiere and a discussion of the film by Oscar-winning director and film restoration champion, Martin Scorsese. Show time is 7pm local time.

Peter O'Toole and Omar Sharif in Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Tickets for all four events are on sale now. Click here for more information on each special screening and links to state-by-state listings of participating theaters.

And now, a word on The Birds from Alfred Hitchcock...

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A TV Tour of Hitchcock Film Locations and Edna May Wonacott's First On-Camera Interview

Bodega School House

Eye on the Bay, a feature of KPIX, CBS’s San Francisco TV outlet, was recently on the trail of director Alfred Hitchcock, traveling around the Bay Area to take an up-close look at locations used in his films. The 20-minute piece, Hitchcock Step-By-Step, focuses on sites featured in Shadow of a Doubt (1943), The Birds (1963) and Vertigo (1958). Aaron Leventhal, co-author of the definitive Hitchcock-in-the-Bay-Area guidebook, Footsteps in the Fog, discusses the director’s work in the region, providing fascinating production background as well as information on many locations. Hitchcock’s granddaughter, Tere Carruba, talks about her grandfather from a personal point of view and Edna May Wonacott, the last surviving featured cast member of Shadow of a Doubt, speaks on television for the first time about how she was chosen for the film and what it was like to work with Alfred Hitchcock.


Clips from each movie accompany location visits. Eye on the Bay host Brian Hackney, a Hitchcock fan, guides the tour.

Note: A brief (15 sec.) commercial spot opens each segment. Closing spots at the end of segments can easily be skipped.

Old Courthouse Square, Santa Rosa

Click here to view Part 1. An 8-minute segment with a tour of Santa Rosa locations for Shadow of a Doubt and an interview with Edna May Wonacott Green ("Ann Newton"), now living in Arizona.

Click here to view Part 2, a 5-minute segment shot in Bodega Bay, where The Birds was filmed in 1962. The Hitchcock production has had a lasting effect on the small Bay Area town; it’s estimated that 10,000 tourists come each year specifically to visit locations featured in The Birds.

Click here to view Part 3, a 5-minute segment that spotlights sites seen in Vertigo. This tour takes us from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Mission at San Juan Batista and many locations in between.

Click here for Part 4. Just over 1-1/2 minutes long, it references Rebecca (1940) and Marnie (1964) and ventures to the estate Hitchcock purchased in Scotts Valley while shooting location footage for Rebecca, his first American film. It was Hitchcock’s much beloved home away from Hollywood.

Edna May Wonacott on the set with Alfred Hitchcock, 1942

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Woody Allen, Master of Suspense?

This post is my contribution to The Best Hitchcock Films Hitchcock Never Made blogathon hosted by Tales of the Easily Distracted and Classic Becky's Brain Food. Click here for more information and links to participating blogs.

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On the face of it, the only thing Alfred Hitchcock and Woody Allen seem to have in common is the distinction of being aknowledged as preeminent auteurs. As Michael Newton put it in The Guardian earlier this year, "Along with Alfred Hitchcock, Allen must be the most recognizable director in the history of cinema."

Hitchcock, who spent most of his career working within the studio system, developed the habit early on of planning and shooting his films so carefully that they were virtually immune to being re-cut by anyone else. Then, in 1954, he entered into a deal with Paramount that allowed him to work autonomously, provided generous production budgets and gave him ownership of those films he both produced and directed. Allen‘s career as a director took off in the 1970s, just as a new generation of independent-minded filmmakers swept into Hollywood. Almost from the beginning he had a remarkable arrangement with his financiers and distributors: as long as he stayed within budget he would have complete artistic freedom. Hitchcock, who began in the silent era where he gained experience in art direction, was influenced by German expressionism and Soviet montage theory and approached film as visual storytelling. Allen began as a writer and, naturally, has relied more on dialogue and use of the long master shot in his films. Hitchcock became synonymous with big movies with high production values while Allen has made films with an "art house" sensibility and appeal on relatively small budgets.

And yet, in 2005 Woody Allen made a film of distinctly “Hitchcockian” elements. Match Point is a sexy thriller about luck and morality set in modern-day London. The film showcases two intensely magnetic stars, Jonathan Rhys Meyers (Bend it Like Beckham, Mission Impossible III, The Tudors) and Scarlett Johansson (Lost in Translation, Iron Man II, The Avengers).

 
With a little luck it goes forward and you win. Or maybe it doesn't, and you lose...

Chris Wilton (Rhys Meyers) is a former professional tennis player hired by a posh London tennis club as an instructor. There he meets Tom Hewett (Matthew Goode), scion of an extremely moneyed British family. The two become friendly and when Tom discovers Chris enjoys opera, he invites him to join his family in their box at the Royal Opera House for a performance of La Traviata. There Chris meets Tom’s parents and his eligible and instantly smitten sister, Chloe (Emily Mortimer); romance blooms. Soon after, Chris meets Nola Rice (Johansson), Tom’s luscious fiancée, an aspiring American actress. While the Hewett progeny are attractive enough physically, their wealth, position and lifestyle of culture and privilege are even more appealing. Chris and Nola are good-looking, charismatic creatures and, much as each knows they are onto a good thing with their respective lovers, sparks fly between them.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Scarlett Johansson as Chris Wilton and Nola Rice

This Woody Allen-penned, Oscar-nominated story could easily have appealed to Alfred Hitchcock who knew not only the value of a good, well-scripted story, but also made two films about tennis playing protagonists with problematic relationships and status issues who become involved in murder. In Strangers on a Train (1951), competitive tennis player Guy Haines aspires to a loftier position in life and hopes to divorce his small-town floozy wife so he can marry the daughter of a U.S. senator. In Dial M for Murder (1954), retired tennis player Tony Wendice, who has discovered that his wealthy wife has been carrying on a serious love affair, fears he may lose his meal ticket and cushy lifestyle.

But before any inkling of murder surfaces in Match Point, Chris, who is headed for marriage to Chloe and a good job with “one of” her father’s companies, develops a fascination with Nola. When, one day, he runs into her on the street, the two end up having drinks together. They talk about themselves and their relationships with Chloe and Tom and the elder Hewetts. Nola remarks that Eleanor, Tom and Chloe’s mother, hates her but that Chris is more fortunate, he’s “being groomed.”

Nola: You’re going to do very well for yourself, unless you blow it.

Chris: And how am I going to blow it?

Nola: By making a pass at me.

Chris: What makes you think that’s going to happen?

Nola: Men always seem to wonder. They think I’d be something very special.

Scarlett Johansson will portray Janet Leigh In "Hitchcock" (2013)

The two laugh, but Chris is powerfully tempted. Scarlett Johansson's Nola Rice begins as an assured, almost taunting beauty confident of her sexual appeal. She isn't quite the Grace Kelly version of the Hitchcock blonde, but falls somewhere between the worldly hedonism of Ingrid Bergman at the beginning of Notorious (1946) and Kim Novak's subdued sultriness in Vertigo (1958). A blonde who flirts with danger, Nola is Hitchcock's kind of woman.

When fate eventually provides the moment, the two indulge in a frenzy of passion, but Nola warns, "this can't lead anyplace." Chris goes on to marry Chloe and Tom later breaks off with Nola (Tom: "mother poisoned the well"). Chris adapts to life on the corporate fast track, he and Chloe move into a spectacular, glass-encased apartment overlooking the Thames and she is soon fixated on becoming pregnant. The vitality begins to drain from Chris's life. As luck will have it, he and Nola meet again and this time she, who is beginning to lose her self-confidence and show slight signs of wear, is available. A torrid affair begins. As Chris embarks on a double life, the atmosphere quickens with tension. When his romance with Nola hits the wall of reality and she begins to pose a threat, unrelenting suspense mounts until a neatly executed plot twist brings unexpected resolution.

The man who said, "I'd rather be lucky than good" saw deeply into life...

What helps to create the film's tension and suspense are themes and motifs that echo Hitchcock:

• The Wrong Man - Occasionally Hitchcock turned this theme on its head and the-innocent-man-accused would be a secondary character rather than the protagonist. This character's sudden death puts an end to further police investigation. The device is employed in both Blackmail (1929) and Shadow of a Doubt (1943)  - it also occurs in Match Point.
• Doubles - A recurrent Hitchcock theme in which two characters seem kindred spirits until their bond is broken. Classic examples are the relationships between Guy Haines and Bruno Anthony in Stangers on a Train and "the two Charlies" in Shadow of a Doubt. Chris and Nola appear to be two of a kind when they meet over a ping pong table. But, as she learns, he plays "a very aggressive game."
• Obsession - Vertigo is a virtual meditation on obsession, but Hitchcock contemplated fascination several times. Young Charlie is enchanted by her Uncle Charlie in Shadow of a Doubt, Bruno is obsessed with Guy in Strangers on a Train, two young men are enthralled with a philosophy in Rope (1948), in Rear Window (1954) L.B. Jeffries becomes obsessed with his neighbors' lives and his belief that a murder has been committed. In Match Point, Chris develops a fixation on Nola; later, their roles reverse.
• The staircase motif is an image Alfred Hitchcock used frequently - famously in Suspicion (1941), Shadow of a Doubt, Notorious, Strangers on a Train, Vertigo and Psycho (1960). Staircases are prominently featured in Match Point.
• The dominant mother is another Hitchcock trademark. Mrs. Bates is a powerful unseen presence in Psycho; in Notorious, Mme. Sebastian has all but emasculated her son. Outspoken Eleanor Hewett's disapproval of Nola in Match Point is pivotal.
• Landmarks are common backdrops for important scenes in Hitchcock films - the list is long, from the British Museum in Blackmail forward. Match Point showcases London landmarks including The Tate Modern museum, The Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, the stunning Parliament View Apartments and The Queen's Club. Unlike Allen's treatment of New York in Manhattan (1979), Match Point is no homage to a city, rather, the attractions of London enhance the film's narrative.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers

As well known for his ability to cast a film as Alfred Hitchcock, Woody Allen has said that his philosophy is to “hire the best actors, shut up and get out of their way.” One of Match Point’s great strengths is its cast, especially Jonathan Rhys Meyers in the central role. His Chris Wilton subtly and evocatively transforms from a beguiling “boy from Ireland come to London” who would like to do something special with his life, to a remote and preoccupied rising executive with dark secrets on his compliant conscience. Rhys Meyer’s sympathetic introduction along with selective point-of-view camera work engages the viewer; Chris is captivating. By the time he has fallen into desperation and is entangled in murder, we find ourselves complicit and anxious about his fate. Hitchcock managed this trick many times with his proclivity for point-of-view editing and masterful casting. Who could help but identify with Robert Walker’s Bruno Anthony in Strangers on a Train as he struggles to retrieve a lighter from a drain so that he can plant it as false evidence? Who doesn't share the nervousness of Anthony Perkins’s Norman Bates in Psycho as he waits for a car to sink after he’s pushed it into a swamp?

Woody Allen was elated with Match Point and was quoted widely at the time of its release saying he considered it his best film to date. Everything had come together, he said, and the production had been blessed with luck. Every actor exceeded his expectations, there was no trouble gaining access to desired locations and even the weather cooperated. He reflected that the storyline lent itself to the film medium and he’d been able to take advantage of that, focusing on action as much as dialogue. The movie, best described as a “moral thriller,” was his first successful drama and reinvigorated his career. Allen’s screenplay was nominated for an Oscar and Jonathan Rhys Meyers was awarded the Chopard Trophy at Cannes.

Filming Match Point: Scarlett Johansson and Woody Allen on the set

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Sources:
Conversations with Woody Allen by Eric Lax, Knopf (2007)
Woody Allen: cinema's great experimentalist by Michael Newton, The Guardian, January 13, 2012 (quote only)

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Break out the champagne (again), the '55 Hitchcock...

Alfred Hitchcock’s To Catch a Thief screens today at the 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival. In celebration of the third annual greatest-classic-film-festival-in-the-world, I’m posting this new and improved version of a piece on To Catch a Thief that first appeared here on New Year’s Day 2011.

Traditionally, champagne is the drink du jour (or nuit) at New Year’s, and so champagne it shall be now. A bottle of ‘96 Dom Pérignon Rosé would be fitting, but I’m in the mood for something really special…an old favorite… Hitchcock’s distinctive ’55 vintage from the Cote d'Azur. To Catch a Thief (1955), a delectable “Hitchcock champagne,” boasts a rare combination of elegance and flair. Light-bodied with a smooth finish that lingers, it remains unmatched, though it has been imitated far and wide for decades.

"the azure coast" of France

A jaunty score sets the tone as opening credits roll over a shot of an international travel service with a poster in the window, “If you like life, you’ll love France.” The tinkling keys of a grand piano hint at continental sophistication and adventure long before the first scream bemoaning stolen jewelry issues from a Riviera hotel balcony.

Quickly the action picks up speed with a colorful cruise through the Cote d'Azur as French police race to the village of Sainte-Jeannet and the hillside villa of retired jewel thief and prime suspect, John Robie (Cary Grant). From these early sequences and throughout the film, cinematographer Robert Burks displays VistaVision/Technicolor to full effect; it was Hitchcock's first use of the widescreen/color process that would become a signature of his color films for the rest of the 1950s.

Cinematographer Robert Burks

Alfred Hitchcock and Robert Burks had initially worked together five years earlier following the director’s return to the U.S. after making two films in England. Hitchcock was beginning production on Strangers on a Train for Warner Bros. and the studio cinematographer assigned to the project was 40-year-old Burks. It would be the beginning of a fabled partnership. Burks began his career at 19 in the Warner Bros. special effects lab when Hal Wallis, who favored shadows and high contrast on the screen, was in charge of production. Burks apprenticed under James Wong Howe, worked his way up to DP and, by 1948, had risen to cinematographer.

The early influence of German expressionism on Hitchcock corresponded nicely with the influences Burks absorbed at Warner Bros. and the two would collaborate on 12 films from 1951 – 1964, every picture Hitchcock made during that period except Psycho. Like Burks, Hitchcock had intimate knowledge of special effects and had an affinity for scenes of complex imagery. One of the most memorable in the Hitchcock/Burks canon came in Strangers on a Train with the scene in which Robert Walker’s murder of Laura Elliott is reflected in the lens of her fallen eyeglasses.

Hitchcock (top center) beside the VistaVision camera

Robert Burks was Oscar-nominated for Strangers and again for Rear Window. With To Catch a Thief, he finally won an Academy Award for cinematography. From 1955 – 1958, Burks shot five Hitchcock films in VistaVision/ Technicolor; four of the five were for Paramount Pictures. Paramount had been the only major film studio to balk at the widescreen CinemaScope system when it came on the scene in 1953. The studio set out to develop a process of its own and worked with Eastman Kodak to develop VistaVision, a method that delivered a higher resolution widescreen version of 35 mm. The VistaVision process printed down large format negatives to standard 35 mm, creating a finer-grained print and improved image. The use of Technicolor's dye transfer process was key to VistaVision color image quality. For his first foray into VistaVision/Technicolor, Hitchcock devised a stylish romantic thriller infused with dazzling starpower.

When he introduced a recent screening of To Catch a Thief, TCM’s Robert Osborne remarked that it had “the best asset any film could have...Cary Grant.” Good point. This was the third of Grant’s four Hitchcock pictures and it came nearly ten years after their last collaboration, Notorious (1946), one of the best films in either man’s illustrious filmography. In the interim, Hitchcock’s career had gone into and dramatically come out of a slump. During the same period, Grant had continued to make popular films, but had begun to move away from the kind of part he had trademarked – the dapper, self-effacing man of the world. Following Dream Wife (1953) Grant retired, dissatisfied with the parts and films he was being offered. But then he was approached by Alfred Hitchcock who had a project in mind with the requisite amount of elegance and humor to attract him. In To Catch a Thief Cary Grant returned to type; John Robie, “The Cat,” is a dashing charmer, “a man of obvious good taste” very few could or would want to resist. Grant seldom departed from type during the remaining years of his career.

To Catch a Thief was the third and final film Grace Kelly would make with Hitchcock, who would have worked with her for the rest of his career had she not left movies to become Princess of Monaco. Hitchcock’s breathtaking onscreen vision of Kelly brings to mind Josef von Sternberg’s ravishing cinematic glorification of Marlene Dietrich 20 years earlier. Kelly was a beautiful woman but among the handful of films she made, it was in her films for Hitchcock that her image as a screen goddess achieved perfection. In To Catch a Thief she plays a spoiled rich girl, the ultimate "snow covered volcano" and "Hitchcock blonde."

Grace Kelly and Cary Grant

Grant and Kelly are captivating together onscreen and both deliver iconic characterizations with ease - Grant as a debonair retired thief/innocent man, and she as a haughty/hot debutante. The pair literally generates fireworks.

Jessie Royce Landis

In her first Hitchcock outing, Jessie Royce Landis portrays Kelly’s insouciant and earthy, bourbon-sipping mother. Hitchcock liked to include colorful women as supporting characters in his films, ranging from the ridiculous (Florence Bates in Rebecca) and the oblivious (Patricia Collinge in Shadow of a Doubt), to the observant and wisecracking (Thelma Ritter in Rear Window, Barbara Bel Geddes in Vertigo). Royce Landis portrayed two of the most appealing of the latter type in this film and North by Northwest.

Actor John Williams made his third appearance in a Hitchcock film with To Catch a Thief, this time as an insurance agent helping Robie track down the real jewel thief. His H.H. Hughson is a fine foil for Grant’s Robie. Their early scenes provide Hitchcock the opportunity to have some fun with a favorite theme, the ambiguity of guilt and innocence. Robie tells Hughson flatly that though he “only stole from those who wouldn’t go hungry,” he “kept everything myself.” Chiding Hughson for stealing hotel sundries and cheating on his expense account, Robie comments, “I was an out and out thief…like you.” Robie emphasizes his point with the throwaway line, “I wish I’d known someone in the insurance racket when I went into the burglary business.” Hitchcock toys with subject again when Robie refers to the sensitive hands and delicate touch of his cook and housekeeper, Germaine, who bakes a quiche as "light as air" and who, during the war, “strangled a German general once…without a sound.” 

John Williams, Grace Kelly, Rene Blancard...costumes by Edith Head

While some dismiss To Catch a Thief for lack of substance, there's no question that it is a solid film of its genre. With meticulous craftsmanship and tremendous style, Hitchcock delivered exactly what he intended - a voluptuous romantic thriller. All elements blend in harmony, from the John Michael Hayes screenplay to Robert Burks' VistaVision/ Technicolor photography, Lyn Murray’s score, Edith Head’s eyeball-popping costumes, two scintillating stars and the Cote d’Azur setting. 

To Catch a Thief was successful and influential, and many later films bear its earmarks...most prominently Stanley Donen’s Charade, as well as his Arabesque, William Wyler's How to Steal a Million, Blake Edwards' The Pink Panther and countless romance/thriller romps ever since.

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One of the principal  themes of this year's 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival is Style in the Movies. Kimberly Truhler of GlamAmor.com, who is attending and blogging on the festival, produced and hosts the following video, Cinema Style File - Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief: 

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