I am very excited! On the heels of the three-hour adventure that was Heat, I am now sitting down to one of the last great Hitchcock films I've yet to see, the highest-ranking suspense film on the AFI Top 100 list: Vertigo.
I'm very honored to count among my friends Jessica, whose love for Hitchcock spilled over while we lived together. Most of the following we watched together, or I watched on her suggestion: Rebecca, Suspicion, Shadow of a Doubt, Spellbound, Rope, Strangers on a Train, Dial M for Murder, Rear Window, The Man Who Knew Too Much, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds, and Frenzy. Vertigo is my 14th film, and there's not a one among them I haven't really liked.
That being said, one hour into this film, I'm not seeing what the big deal is. I mean, it's fine but not spectacular.
And of course, seconds-- literally, seconds-- after finishing that sentence, we got a nice "Huh?" moment that kind of turned things around for now.
"But we're not here to pass judgment..." LOL.
Hitchcock was of course a genius when it came to filmmaking, and I found out that Vertigo is remembered for Hitch's use of zooming in and combining it with reverse tracking to create the "vertigo effect" that so many directors have used since.
There is agreement here that while it's a fine movie, it's a little slow moving. I don't doubt that some of the seemingly endless scenes of Jimmy Stewart as the worst "tailer" of a detective ever could have been truncated. The final rising action and climax/denouement/unraveling were pretty sweet. Very Hitchcockian. But overall, I'd sooner rewatch quite a few of the other films that I prize more highly.
Score: 7.5/10
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