What Are The Similarities Between Vertigo And The Matrix

The film Vertigo, produced by Alfred Hitchcock, demonstrates parallels that tie into modern day movies in the same manner as The Matrix, produced by Joel Silver. Although Vertigo results in fatalities and mourning over loved ones, The Matrix ends in a much more pleasant tone. Together, these movies attempt to convey an illustration about human nature’s desire for control. Not only does The Matrix parallel Vertigo in regards to desire, but in addition to an obsession that altered the main character’s state of mind. An observation about human nature extracted from both films in regard to desire is their constant need for control and uncover the mysteries of life.
One example of a similarity in the introduction of both films were cops tracking down after a suspect. A rooftop chase was taken place by the police in Vertigo and in The Matrix; a searching for a suspicious suspect. Furthermore, there were multiple of the same camera angles that were used to portray the action that was taken place throughout the film. In contrast, Scottie (from the movie Vertigo) was the police hunting down the

criminal, however, in The Matrix, Trinity was the suspect who escaped the cops and defied gravity. Comparable, each character desired something that was unattainable to them that initiated their interest in discovering the essence of living.
As shown by Scottie's actions throughout the film, it is in human nature to have a desire to control your surroundings in a selfish way. Morpheus, just as Scottie, misleads Neo into wanting to figure out what The Matrix is so he would come to find out that he is the One the oracle was talking about in their vision to be able to save them all. Controlling Neo, he gives him a red pill that allows him to be able to constantly track him. Although his intentions are beneficial for Neo and can free him, it is in his human nature to desire power over another human being so that he can expose the reality of Earth in order to make it a much better place to live. Resembling the fascination to control in Vertigo, The Matrix also portrays this because the agents attempt to supervise over Neo and track him wherever he goes to try to stop him from destructing their newly created world. Just as today’s society, objects are able to control people’s mind and their consciousness.
These films consists and deals with the concepts of perception versus reality. In The Matrix, the characters are perceived to believe that they are in real life because if they die in this imaginative world, their mind will believe it to be truly dead. They are in a world controlled by technology and in Hitchcock’s film, he was attempting to convey the theme of illusion that transmits visual motifs. The use of frames and mirrors wittily created by Hitchcock composes of multiple shots in front of a mirror or within the bounds of a doorway, an arch, or a window frame. These objects exemplify a confined portrayal of a sight, not the sight itself. After Scottie sees Madeleine mysteriously disappear into the hotel, he views a figure that appears through a window, and to his surprise, she had never checked in. Scottie’s mind begins to play tricks on him and he is concerned whether or not if she was really there or was she simply a figure of his imagination.
While Neo is in The Matrix, he is presented a spoon by a young girl who explains that if it is in The Matrix, it really does not exist, but is only a lesson for Neo to understand that manipulating The Matrix is not about concentrating on a substance and trying to alter its state of being. Rather, nothing is actually prevailing and there is nothing he can do to revise it but to only change himself. By doing so, he can legitimately be the One who saves the world. Just as Neo perceives to see the world as a perception instead of a reality, Scottie, and his egotistical self, forgot to recognize the reality of the situation that he is too oblivious to understand.
Scottie is having a need for control, however, the setting around him does not allow for him to have this control.

Scottie’s view of the world is changed when he is diagnosed with vertigo and Neo’s view of the world is altered when he finds out about The Matrix and the dangers that it can commit. Neo attempts to control his fate by explaining that he is not the One who can save the world and control the matrix and break its rules. Likewise, Scottie attempts to change and control Madeleine in ways that control her life, however, his life and his basis of happiness are because of her. Trinity was once told by the Oracle she would fall deeply in love with the One, who ended up being Neo. Once she accepted the fact that she admired and cared for Neo and kissed him while he was dead, he came back to life and is able to open his mind and do the impossible as he pleases in The

Matrix.
These two films parallel and illustrate one another by attempting to convey one unified message about human nature; the constant desire for control over others. The Matrix resembles Vertigo because both elucidates human obsession over objects that can distort one’s mind. The directors of the movies inspire the audience to speculate the many themes and motifs that were created throughout the film. Hitchcock and Wachowski wisely applied filmmaking techniques by uniquely creating framing shots, limiting information to the audience, and analyzing the anxious nature of the main characters. Accomplishing this, the audience becomes intrigued and obtains a different outlook on the movie, causing disorientation, a replica to vertigo.