Hitchcock’s Use of Technical Signatures in his Film Vertigo
The films of Alfred Hitchcock provide some of the best evidence in favor of the auteur theory. Hitchcock uses many techniques that act as signatures on his films, enabling the viewer to possess an understanding of any Hitchcock film before watching it. His most famous signature is his cameo appearance in each of his films, but Hitchcock also uses more technical signatures like doubling, visual contrast, and strategically placed music to create suspense.
Hitchcock’s use of doubles is apparent throughout most of his films. In Vertigo, the image of Madeline and Scotty’s passionate embrace is repeated several times during the film. In Scotty’s life, Hitchcock also places many instances of doubles, such as the two women he loves, Madeline’s dual roles as two different women throughout the plot, and the two identical deaths of the women he witnesses. Doubling is also apparent between Madeline and the fictional Carlotta, especially in the scene in the art museum, where the flowers, the hairstyle, and the position of Madelin...
In the film industry, there are directors who merely take someone else’s vision and express it in their own way on film, then there are those who take their own visions and use any means necessary to express their visions on film. The latter of these two types of directors are called auteurs. Not only do auteurs write the scripts from elements that they know and love in life, but they direct, produce, and sometimes act in their films as well. Three prime examples of these auteurs are: Kevin Smith, Spike Lee and Alfred Hitchcock.
leading up to and surrounding President Abraham Lincoln’s death. The purpose of this book is to
The auteur theory is a view on filmmaking that consists of three equally important premises: technical competence, interior meaning, and personal signature of the director. Auteur is a French word for author. The auteur theory was developed by Andrew Sarris, a well-known American film critic. Technical competence of the Auteur deals with how the director films the movie in their own style. Personal signature includes recurring themes that are present within the director’s line of work with characteristics of style, which serve as a signature. The third and ultimate premise of the Auteur theory is the interior meaning which is basically the main theme behind the film.
Though complex and brilliantly written for its time, the plot of Alfred Hitchcock’s film, Vertigo, is only half of the genius behind it. Alfred Hitchcock’s unique presence as an auteur is truly what sets his films apart. There is symmetry to his shots that give the film an artistic feel, as if each frame were a painting. Many times, within this symmetry, Hitchcock places the characters in the center of the frame; or if not centered, then balanced by whatever else is adding density to the shot. For example, as Madeline sits and looks at the painting in the museum, there is a balance within the frame. To counter-act her position to the right of the painting, Hitchcock puts a chair and another painting on the left side, which is visually pleasing to the eye of the audience. The use of red and green not only adds a visual effect as well, but later serves as a clue that Madeline is not actually dead, when the women who looks like her is wearing a green dress.
Wilentz, Sean. "WHO LINCOLN WAS. (Cover story)." New Republic 240, no. 12/13 (July 15, 2009): 24-47. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed February 26, 2011).
One major attribute in Hitchcock films is how creatively Hitchcock tricks the audience about the fate of the characters and the sequence of events. Many people argue that it is a tactic by Hitchcock to surprise his audience in order to increase the suspense of the movie. For example, in Shadow of a Doubt, the audience assumes that young Charlie is an innocent young girl who loves her uncle dearly. However as the movie progresses, Young Charlie is not as innocent as the audience suspects. Young Charlie, once a guiltless child, ends up killing her evil uncle. In Vertigo, the same Hitchcock trickery takes place. In the beginning, the audience has the impression that the Blond women is possessed by another woman who is trying to kill her. The audience also has the notion that the detective is a happy man who will solve the murder case correctly. Just before the movie ends, the audience realizes that the detective was specifically hired by a man to kill his wife. The detective, in the end, seems to be the hopeless, sad victim.
bank. Marion went home there was a close up shot on the money then on
Considered as the defining work of the 1920s, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald was published in 1925, when America was just coming out of one of the most violent wars in the nation’s history. World War 1 had taken the lives of many young people who fought and sacrificed for our country on another continent. The war left many families without fathers, sons, and husbands. The 1920s is an era filled with rich and dazzling history, where Americans experienced changes in lifestyle from music to rebellion against the United States government. Those that are born into that era grew up in a more carefree, extravagant environment that would affect their interactions with others as well as their attitudes about themselves and societal expectations. In this novel, symbols are used to represent the changing times and create a picture of this era for generations to come. The history, settings, characters, and symbols embedded in The Great Gatsby exemplify life in America during the 1920s.
The civil rights movement was a popular historical movement that worked to allow African Americans to have equal rights and privileges as U.S. citizens. The movement can be defined as a struggle against racial segregation and discrimination that began in the 1950s. Although the origins of the civil rights movement go back to the 1800s, the movement peaked in the 1950s and 1960s. African American men and women, along with whites, organized and led the movement from local to national levels. Many actions of the civil rights movement were concentrated through legal means such as negotiations, appeals, and nonviolent protests. When we think of leaders or icons of the movement we usually think of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. Even though Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. are important figures, their participation in the movement was minimal compared to other unknown or forgotten figures. Howell Raines’s, My Soul Is Rested, contains recollections of voices from followers of the civil rights movement. These voices include students, lawyers, news reporters, and civil right activists. Although the followers of the movement were lesser known, the impact they made shaped the society we live in today.
Hitchcock Vertigo stars James Stewart as Scottie, a retired detective, and Kim Novak as Judy Barton, who gets disguised as Madeleine, a woman hired by Scottie's friend to act as his wife in order to frame Scottie. The story takes place in San Francisco in the 1950's. The film opens on a high building, where officer Scottie and his partner are in pursuit of a suspect. Scottie's partner's life is on the line, and only he can save him. Unfortunately, he has vertigo, a fear of heights.
“American civil rights movement.” Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica Online Academic Edition. Encyclopedia Britannica Inc., 2013. .
Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo is a film which functions on multiple levels simultaneously. On a literal level it is a mystery-suspense story of a man hoodwinked into acting as an accomplice in a murder, his discovery of the hoax, and the unraveling of the threads of the murder plot. On a psychological level the film traces the twisted, circuitous routes of a psyche burdened down with guilt, desperately searching for an object on which to concentrate its repressed energy. Finally, on an allegorical or figurative level, it is a retelling of the immemorial tale of a man who has lost his love to death and in hope of redeeming her descends into the underworld.
John Wilkes Booth was a prominent Shakespearean actor with militant Confederate sympathies and an abhorrence for President Lincoln. Booth believed that the south’s institution of slavery was sacred and this country “was formed for the white man and not the black,” therefore anyone who challenged this belief was a tyrant that needed to be exterminated. In Booth’s hometown of Baltimore he would find a great deal of bitter opponents to share his views and it would be here where groundwork of assassination threats would take their preliminary form. Late autumn of 1864 Lincoln would be reelected and Booth’s anti-Lincoln obsession and hatred would increase. Motivated by guilt, rage and malignant narcissism, Booth would resolve to put a plan into
Auteur theory holds that, ‘a director’s films reflect that director’s personal creative vision, as if he/she were the primary author. From the earliest silent films to contemporary times motion pictures have crossed over and both entertained and educated the viewing audience.
...and changed the horror genre forever. Alfred Hitchcock's use of actor, lighting, sound, scripting and mise-en-scène kept the audience on the edge of their seats and second guessing themselves. Hitchcock's idea of Norman cconnected with the audience and, even today, his character continues to deceive many. From Norman's nervous ticks to his murderous side 'Mother', it was planned flawlessly. Norman Bates was a combination of an author, director and actor, perfectly adapted to screen and perfectly portrayed.