Filmmaker Weakest Link: Alfred Hitchcock - The Finale

Tough choice, I voted to keep NBNW.

I would have lost Dial M and added Frenzy to the original list.

My preferred final two: Strangers on a Train and NBNW.

 

Yep. The perfect Hitchcock film. I love popcorn.

 

I agree. You also have my James Bond "license to poll".

As to this poll...it's almost impossible for me to pick between "North by Northwest" and "Rear Window" (or many of the films in the original poll) but...

...the neighboring apartments in "Rear Window" all seem to be like a microcosm of (or representative windows into) Hitchcock's thematic soul to me with interesting ongoing miniature stories of their own. (Sex, humor, loneliness, murder...it's like a bunch of Hitchcock mini-movies all rolled up into one) The sum of the parts are defintely equal to the whole and it seems like a good representative cross-section of all Hitchcock films. Throw in a little voyeurism, some sexy Grace Kelly and a helping of Jimmy Stewart for good measure and you've got the perfect Hitchcock stew as far as I'm concerned.

 

North by North West.

Tough call...

How about favorite Woody Allen film..

 

Woody Allen, the Coens, John Ford. I'm not sure what else has been done.

 

As a short stop-gap, do a quick George Lucas (as director) poll. Be interesting to see where sympathies lie...

 

Did I? I'm not sure - discuss!

I actually think I'm pretty set with discussion questions - I just use the same ones each time. Now I wanna figure out more potential WL subjects!

 

Yeah, that'd be an AWESOME WL!

Actually, it might be interesting to see if "Star Wars" would beat "American Graffiti". I'd assume so, but given this board's leaning toward nostalgia, maybe not.

Or maybe some of you would stack the thread to ensure "Phantom Menace" wins!

 

Woody Allen is a good one, too - I'll definitely do that one.

Here're my plans for the next few (not necessarily in this order):

James Bond
Ridley Scott
Woody Allen
Coppola

I'd reassess after that. John Ford and Clint Eastwood are locks, and I'll probably spread to actors more to keep things fresh. We should be set for a while!

 

I remember you had a round where you let people suggest future discussion questions. Then people posted suggestions. Then other people started responding to those suggested questions. You had to intervene: hey, no discussion of those questions -- I'm saving them for future rounds!

Can we start with a broader list of films (so everyone's favorites get in), and eliminate three or four for early rounds? I know you want to keep the game to only a certain number of rounds, which makes sense.

You can also think about doing the game with actors who have a good body of films: Tom Hanks, Russell Crowe, Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson.

 

Maybe, but I don't like to overwhelm people with too many films to eliminate, especially since we've established the 2-fers in the early rounds. I'll probably expand the usual 12-movie cap for the Bond thread, but otherwise I plan to stick with it...

 

Rear Windoe to go. North by Northwest is the film that got me started on both Hitch and Cary Grant. This would be my final pair, as well. Hooray! We got it right (so far).

We haven't done John Ford yet, though I suspect that's a tough list to narrow down. Orson Welles? Too predictable a winner? Kurosawa? Allen?

 

Rear Window and Vertigo would have been my choices although I'm not displeased with the final two.

I would have added "Frenzy" from the other end of the spectrum (it's a minor classic IMHO and the last "great" Hitch film--edgy) I'm also a fan of "Stage Fright", well, that's me.

It's got a brilliant opening sequence where Hitch tells the truth visually but the narrator "lies" to the audience verbally a major clue that peeved viewers at the time--he was just too sopisticated for the time.

I'd disagree. I think he was lost in the 60's after "The Birds" because everyone was aping his work and he had to rediscover his sense of passion away from making "profitable" "studio" films. There was also a major shift in terms of technique with avant garde techniques and subject matter slipping into the mainstream in a big way. He had always touched on these areas himself but they were being mined other a big group of directors aside from Hitch. He was concerned with making films that had wide appeal and made money for Universal since he was a big stock holder but also felt responsible for his films to do well since his former agent Lew Wasserman was now the head of the studio. He rediscovered his muse with "Frenzy" and it is a powerful, suspsensful, dark and macabrely humorous film. While "Family Plot" didn't live up to that potential it showed (like "Frenzy") more confidence than at any other time prior to 1963. If he'd been in better health or younger, I think we might have seen some interesting pictures from Hitchcock.

 

I vote for North by Northwest to win. My preferred final would've been Psycho vs. Vertigo. I nominate John Carpenter and Wes Craven for filmmaker weakest link.

 

My two favorite Hitchcocks are The Lady Vanishes and The 39 Steps.

The British version of The Man Who Knew Too Much is a close third.

Strangers On a Train, Shadow of a Doubt, and Notorious round out my top six.

 

I didn't play this time since I've seen most Hitchcocks too long ago to do them justice. But I would like to suggest some directors apart from the once already mentioned.

David Cronenberg
Jim Jarmush
Sergio Leone
(or are 12 movies to choose from required?)

From those mentioned I think Eastwood, Carpenter and Lynch would be interesting for me.

What about Spike Lee?
Walter Hill could be fun.
Peter Greenaway. Too artsy? Too 80s?

And I still think Alan Parker is a good idea (but of course I don't want to force him on you )









Parkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparkerparker!

 

Voted for Rear

1) I'd omit "Lifeboat" for "The Man Who Knew Too Much".

2) My final pair: Vertigo & North By Northwest.

 

So you all don't mind Cary Grant's over top first 30 minutes of North By Northwest? That's always done it for me. His drunk performance just didn't work for me and totally clashes with the rest(fantastic) of the film.

 

"Rear Window" is a great film (and Grace Kelly is incredibly sexy in it ) but "North By Northwest" is more fun and more re-watchable.

I think he's hilarious, it works for me. The part I don't like is the kid in blue in the cafeteria covering his ears well before Eve reveals the gun and fires it (obviously not the first take of the scene!).

 

Yes, it is over the top as is the car scene while he's driving drunk. But Hitchcock liked to get a little bit of everything in his movies - suspense, mystery, romance, AND humor. Not sure that a drunk scene is all that humorous (at least nowadays) but I think that's what he was going for.

See, I like that scene. I had watched the movie several times without noticing that and I read about it on-line and made a point to look for it. It's kinda cute.

 

The kid covering his ears in NBNW is the only one that can still hear above 20kKz.

Re: Drunk driving scene/humor. If Cary Grant got willfully drunk, it would be antisocial/inappropriate. He is forced to drink and so he retains his heroism. I'm sure they thought this through. I think it's a pretty terrifying scene. It's not played as humorous. The scene is jail and the courthouse (featuring Chief from Get Smart) is played for laughs.

 

I think the 'forced drinking' scenario clearly has sexual overtones (which certainly drives the scene). The Leonard character definitely represents a form of homosexual terror, with the final line in the scene ("Bottom's up!"), spoken as Thornhill gazes terrifyingly upon a rather phallic bourbon bottle (the entire contents of which he will be forced to consume), being the most obvious double entendre.

All this is well documented in Hitchcock studies, but it's still interesting to note.

 

Happy Birthday, Hitch!

 

Two hours left in the poll, and it's tight tight tight!