Hitchcock

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source: Hitchcock

The film "Hitchcock" is set before and during the filming of "Psycho" and is about Alfred Hitchcock and creative process in getting this film made. Unfortunately, "Hitchcock" is a very uneven film for me. When it talks about how "Psycho" was made and shows the film being made, it's very good. However, when it comes to the private lives of Alfred Hitchcock and his wife, Alma, it became very problematic for me. According to the film, Alma may have been cheating on him and the relationship was quite troubled. However, every source I read about them refutes this. Further, the Hitchcock's daughter, Patricia, is never mentioned and she apparently wasn't consulted for the film. Why? Perhaps this is because the filmmakers really didn't intend to give a balanced or realistic portrait of the director--and fiction is much more entertaining. I have a serious problem with this--entertaining folks by sullying the names of folks who cannot defend themselves because they have long since died. While the film IS entertaining, it is also unsettling because of its portrayals of the Hitchcocks. By the way, at one point Hitchcock's agent mentions that "Winchester '73" is a bad Jimmy Stewart film. This is complete crap--it's an excellent western. Here again, the filmmakers don't have a lot of respect for the dead.

In 1959, Alfred Hitchcock (Anthony Hopkins) is not successful with "North by Northwest", having bad reviews. He reads Robert Bloch's novel "Psycho" and decides to make a movie; however the Paramount studios refuse the project. Hitchcock discusses his idea with his agent Lew Wasserman (Michael Stuhlbarg) and decides to finance the production with his savings against all odds and is supported by his wife Alma Reville (Helen Mirren). Hitchcock casts the cast with Alma and his assistant Peggy Robertson (Toni Collette) and Paramount is responsible for the distribution. Meanwhile Hitchcock is under additional tension since he believes that Alma is having a love affair with Whitfield Cook (Danny Huston). "Hitchcock" focuses in a period of the life of the Master of Suspense Alfred Hitchcock during the production and release of "Psycho". This behind the scenes shows a disturbed man under tension and quite arrogant genius. It is amazing to see the failure with "North by Northwest" and how this master has not wined an Oscar when we see the kind of movies and directors are nominated to (and wins) the Oscar in the last years showing how decadent Hollywood is. My vote is seven. Title (Brazil): "Hitchcock"

'Hitchcock' - for a film boasting to document the "Master of Suspense" creating his most shocking film it doesn't half bore the arse off you. Hopkins' one-note impersonation of Hitchcock comes over like Austin Power's 'Dr Evil' on morphine, while the true interest at the heart of his and his wife's (Helen Mirren's) relationship - that he was impotent and she was a lesbian - is hardly touched upon, in favour of a rather glib subplot involving her and a potential fling with Danny Huston. Alfred himself is portrayed as he portrayed himself in his 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents...' TV show introductions - deliberately monotone, sepulchral and lascivious. By all accounts - including Janet Leigh's own memoir - Hitch was as giddy as a schoolboy on set and had a hand in everything. Hopkins shows flashes of brilliance, but he, frankly, was not the actor to portray Hitchcock. Matt Lucas or Paul Giamatti (provided the accent was done well) have more of the spirit for example. The movie's attempt to fuse Hitchcock with William Castle was misleading toward the end and ultimately the great man himself would have been bored rigid - a crime he found unforgivable in movie makers. A stagy, TV-style biopic was hardly worthy of the most brilliant populist filmmaker that ever lived - the father of the modern "event" movie - and to have him shuffle about as a rather obnoxious restaurant patron in a state of almost somnambulistic autism just showed the filmmakers to be as fooled by the public image Hitchcock tried to portray as any other fleeting TV viewer. Other than a gleefully fan sating final scene, the film is all, in all, disappointing.