BEFORE: I can squeeze another film in before I have to catch the train back to NY. Really, it's better if I take a morning train and go straight to my office than if I take a late Sunday night train, then catch the subway home at a late hour, then have to take the subway AGAIN in the morning. My office is so close to Penn Station, staying over another night just makes a little more sense. Linking from "The Wrong Man", Vera Miles links back to James Stewart (last seen in "The Man Who Knew Too Much") via the same path I mentioned last time.
THE PLOT: A retired San Francisco detective suffering from acrophobia investigates the strange activities of an old friend's wife, all the while becoming dangerously obsessed with her.
AFTER: Jeez, it's bad enough that Hitchcock pre-emptively ripped off "Throw Momma From the Train", did he have to do the same thing with "Body Double"?
I didn't really mention the camera tricks that Hitchcock was experimenting with back in his early films - and I don't mean tricks like that cheezy rear-projection to make it look like people were in a moving car or skiing down a mountain when they weren't. I mean the superimposing of images, the odd angles and super deep-focus lenses that were used to convey particular emotions, usually when some character was going mad or tormented in some way. That trend of his hit its peak with "Vertigo", I think.
Odd colors, and in one case actual animation, are used here for dramatic effect to convey the inner torment of our lead character - and then to convey his fear of heights, there's that camera trick where the cameras pans back while it zooms in (or is it the other way around?) to make that sort of unnerving, space-is-getting-elongated sort of feeling. Most commonly, it's now called the "Jaws" effect, after being used to convey that sinking feeling Brody had while standing on the beach, and you see it in a TON of horror movies, but it's possible that its best use was in this film, so really. it should be called the "Vertigo" effect.
Hitchcock was still obsessed with finding the perfect murder. Wasn't he EVER satisfied? Again, though, we see plot points that are SO outlandish, SO convoluted, SO hard to believe, it really makes one wonder why someone would go to SO much trouble, when divorce is much easier, albeit costlier, in the long run. No right-thinking human in the real world would arrange a scheme that's so problematic.
Instead we (and our hero) are told that a man's wife is going insane, perhaps even being taken over by the spirit of a long-dead woman whom she happens to resemble. She'll disappear for long periods of time, either gazing at the dead woman's portrait in an art museum, or tooling around in her old, rundown house. And then afterwards she'll claim to have no memory of doing these things, or trying to take her own life, so the only possible conclusion is that she's being controlled by forces beyond the grave. (or is she?)
It's also worth drawing a distinction between acrophobia and vertigo, even though the main character here suffers from both. Vertigo, with its dizziness and such, seems to be more of a physical condition, and acrophobia more of a mental one. I don't consider acrophobia to be an irrational fear, however, I think it's a very valid fear. I have a fear of heights myself, but it prompts me to not do silly things like rock-climbing or bungee-jumping, so I think any fear is a positive one if it helps keep you alive.
Also starring Kim Novak (last seen in "The Man With the Golden Arm"), Barbara Bel Geddes, Tom Helmore, Ellen Corby (last seen in "Shane").
RATING: 6 out of 10 gray suits
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