I just finished watching Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 psychological thriller Vertigo. The movie was fantastic on so many levels, but what I really enjoyed was Hitchcock's awesome use of the camera to tell the story.
The movie is about an ex-detective, Scottie (played by the ever-amazing James Stewart), who becomes terribly afraid of heights after witnessing his partner fall to his death. After retiring from the force he gets hired as a private-eye by an old college friend. His friend needs him to follow his wife (Kim Novak) who he believes to have been possessed by her dead grandmother; she goes out for hours at a time and doesn't have any recollection of the events that take place. As Scottie follows her around San Fransisco a much larger mystery unravels and he is continually plagued by his crippling acrophobia and guilt from losing his partner.
A lot of the movie takes place inside the head of Scottie, and Hitchcock uses some neat camera tricks and an animated dream sequence to show this without the need for narration. In order to give the viewer an idea of what Vertigo feels like he uses a technique that is apparently called a dolly-zoom (thanks wikipedia). It is hard to explain if you have never played around with a zoom lens before, or if you haven't seen it used in a movie, but it works so well in this situation. So well in fact, that it has apparently been nicknamed a Hitchcock or Vertigo Zoom. I'll try and find an example on youtube or something... Awesome, this has both of the good dolly-zooms from vertigo.
The movie is about an ex-detective, Scottie (played by the ever-amazing James Stewart), who becomes terribly afraid of heights after witnessing his partner fall to his death. After retiring from the force he gets hired as a private-eye by an old college friend. His friend needs him to follow his wife (Kim Novak) who he believes to have been possessed by her dead grandmother; she goes out for hours at a time and doesn't have any recollection of the events that take place. As Scottie follows her around San Fransisco a much larger mystery unravels and he is continually plagued by his crippling acrophobia and guilt from losing his partner.
A lot of the movie takes place inside the head of Scottie, and Hitchcock uses some neat camera tricks and an animated dream sequence to show this without the need for narration. In order to give the viewer an idea of what Vertigo feels like he uses a technique that is apparently called a dolly-zoom (thanks wikipedia). It is hard to explain if you have never played around with a zoom lens before, or if you haven't seen it used in a movie, but it works so well in this situation. So well in fact, that it has apparently been nicknamed a Hitchcock or Vertigo Zoom. I'll try and find an example on youtube or something... Awesome, this has both of the good dolly-zooms from vertigo.
The other scene that really struck me as brilliant is later in the movie after Scottie has finished making Judy look like Madeline and they begin kissing in her hotel room. The camera does a bunch of 360 degree pans around the couple, but as it goes around them, the background changes from the hotel room the stable where Scottie had his last kiss with Madeline before she died. This scene says so much, without saying a word. The change in background, plus the dizzying affect of the shot really allow you inside Scottie's mind. Fast forward to 3:33ish to see the scene I'm talking about.
Probably wasn't the best movie to watch while I'm sick in bed, but I'm glad I saw it.
Cheers,
Patio
uncle p!
ReplyDeletewe talked about vertigo zoom in film class on friday! and jaws was the example (which was in that youtube video). you are totally subconsciously creepin' on our class.
-kranks
hahaha shit, I should just take that class already.
ReplyDeletewe did talk about the dolly zoom in class, but the prof claimed that it was just a zoom with no dolly involved because he is dumb.
ReplyDelete