Number 11: Vertigo (1958)

Masterpiece.

Back in the day, “masterpiece” did not actually refer to a particularly awe-inspiring work of art. It was simply the work which was required to elevate you to the level of master in your trade. You could have barrels that were masterpieces as easily as paintings or sculptures. Obviously, you had to make something that demonstrated your worthiness for promotion, and so masterpieces were often quite something. But the notion that everything a master made was a masterpiece is nonsense. Maybe they were, in the now colloquial sense of the word, maybe not. But you need a piece to deem you a master, and that is your master-piece.

Why do I mention this? Because I can’t stand Alfred Hitchcock. I almost didn’t put this movie on here because I was worried that if I watched it too many times, I would start hating it. But no, Vertigo is too good for that. Still, I am most decidedly unimpressed by Hitchcock. Rear Window? Bah. North by Northwest? Wake me up when that marathon ends. Psycho? Okay, whatever. The Birds? Good, but not the second coming. Suspicion? Could have been good. Wasn’t. As far as I am concerned, Hitchcock had a tenuous grasp on the title of “master” (or its cinematic equivalent: auteur), and that title is almost entirely beholden to one movie: Vertigo.

It is his masterpiece in both the colloquial and historical sense. All of Hitchcock’s stupid little quirks—painfully slow pacing, mediocre acting, unsubtle camera motion, suspense for the sake of suspense and nothing else, etc.—are either strengths of Vertigo or simply not there. For instance: Jimmy Stewart invented overacting. Seriously, I don’t think there has ever been a scene where he didn’t pull out every trick, facial expression and decibel change in his bag to evince how important that particular scene was. In Vertigo, this makes sense. He is obsessed. Psychotically so. His over the top act is a boon, not a wrecking ball aimed at our suspension of disbelief.

Hitchcock’s indulgent need to drag the simplest gimmick out over interminable periods of time (paranoia for an hour and a half in the Birds, helpless voyeurism for two hours in Rear Window, mistaken identity for two and a half hours in North by Northwest) works in Vertigo, because obsession benefits from an interminable length of time, and in fact probably requires it. The mediocre acting of the woman (women) in the movie makes sense, since she (they) are acting. And the suspense isn’t really there, per se. You are left wondering what is going on more often than you are left on the edge of your seat (though the movie does deliver in that area as well with a few superb scenes in the bell tower).

The herky-jerky camera zooms still bother me. Watch the “vertigo effect” (zooming in while tracking out) in Vertigo, and then watch it in The Lord of the Rings—that’s right, a Peter Jackson film. One of them is subtle and creepy. I’ll give you a hint: it isn’t Vertigo, where the effect looks more like a jump into Warp Drive than an anxiety disorder. But still, these minor baubles aside, Hitchcock was made for this movie. You could almost say that Alfred Hitchcock was Vertigo’s masterpiece.

Next Week: Cramped and Empty, all at the same time.

~Right Thumb~