Vertigo

Year:  1958

Director:  Alfred Hitchcock

Screenplay:  Alec Coppel and Samuel Taylor, based on the novel D'entre les morts by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac

Starring:  James Stewart, Kim Novak, Barbara Bel Geddes, Tom Helmore, Henry Jones

Running Time:  128 minutes

Genre:  Thriller

San Francisco police detective John "Scotty" Ferguson (Stewart) resigns from the force after a rooftop chase results in the death of a fellow police officer and leaves him with crippling acrophobia (fear of heights) and vertigo.  Some time later Scotty is approached by an old schoolfriend, Gavin Elster (Helmore), who wants to hire him to follow his wife, Madeline (Novak), who Ester fears is suicidal.  Scotty accepts the assignment, however in the course of the investigation he falls in love with Madeline.  However his vertigo prevents him form saving her when she plummets from a church bell tower.  A year later, still dealing with his trauma, Scotty becomes obsessed by Judy (Novak), a woman who bears a remarkable resemblance to Madeline.

This is one of the Master of Suspense's strangest and darkest films.  While it still made money on it's original release, it was not as big a hit as Alfred Hitchcock's previous few films, and was widely criticised by fans (including fellow director Orson Welles) and critics.  However it's reputation has grown considerably in recent years, and it is frequently named as one of the greatest films ever made.  James Stewart, who is probably best known for playing All-American nice guys in such films as It's a Wonderful Life (1946), plays against type as an ambiguous antihero.  While the term "toxic masculinity" was probably not coined in 1958, John "Scotty" Ferguson is a perfect example of it.  The most disturbing passage in the film is where Scotty tries to make Judy into the image of the dead Madeline, changing her clothes, hair colour, hair style, makeup, everything - whether she likes it or not.  The act of looking is a major element in Vertigo:  Scotty's vertigo is triggered when he looks down (the sense of vertigo is depicted by the film's signature "reverse zoom" technique, where the camera is moved backwards which zooming in creating a kind of telescoping effect); spying on the blonde, statuesque Madeline, Scotty falls in love with her without ever speaking to her (of course Alfred Hitchcock had a penchant for blondes in his films); Scotty is doomed to watch helplessly as she plunges to her fate, mirroring the fate of his police colleague at the beginning of the film; and when he meets Judy he becomes obsessed with her purely because of her resemblance to Madeline, completely dismissing Judy as a person in her own right.  Madeline herself is obsessed with a portrait of a long dead relative which she spends hours staring at and prompts Elster to comment that she might be possessed by the ghost of the woman in the portrait.  In the opening half an hour or so of the film, it almost seems to be shaping up to be ghost story, and in a way it is, only not in a supernatural sense.  Scotty and Judy are both haunted by Madeline, and Scotty's attempts to turn Judy into Madeline could be seen almost like a possession.  The plot reveals it's mystery about a third of the way into the film, in an almost throwaway scene, indicating that the plot isn't really important, and in fact the reveal is kind of disappointing, but the mysterious atmosphere of the film lingers.  It's very well made, with a beautiful sense of colour.  James Stewart is fantastic, both pitiable and disturbing in the lead role, and Novak is great in the dual role of Madeline and Judy, although the 49 year old James Stewart and the 24 year old Kim Novak make for a very unlikely romantic pairing.  Barbara Bel Geddes provides some humour and some much needed warmth to the film as Scotty's friend Midge, who of course is madly in love with him.  Vertigo is one of Alfred Hitchcock's best films, and while it might not be the greatest film ever made, which of course is a debate which will never end as long as film exists, it is a truly great film.

James Stewart and Kim Novak in Vertigo