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MizhuB's Replies
Heh. No problem.
*****SPOILERS***** Just in case.
I remember seeing the poster for it and thinking, this is my kind of thriller. I remember the reviews comparing it to 'Psycho'. Also seeing Margot Kidder on a talk show promoting it as being so scary.
But I didn't see it until it was on a double feature, second billed with Hitch's 'Family Plot'.
Especially with the comparisons to 'Psycho', I actually knew before I saw it that one of the twins was dead, and the other had a 'split personality' and was also the killer. So there was really no mystery to me.
One thing I was not prepared for, and which surprised me, was how much of it was tongue in cheek. Almost a black comedy. That disappointed me. I expected a straight-on thriller.
I strongly disagree that the opening was pure Hitchcock. I don't think he'd have ever gone for something so hokey.
I thought this was Bernard Herrmann's worst score. The background music was fine, but the theme was overwrought. I liked DePalma's camera work, and the editing.
The Hitchcock movies it reminded me of were 'Psycho', obviously, and 'Rear Window' with all that spying on other apartments.
I liked the location filming. I don't live far from Staten Island. I've taken the ferry many times.
You have to be careful about saying things like this nowadays, but I liked that the initial relationship (or...hookup?) was interracial, yet no mention was made at all about that.
So I would say the scary scenes were scary, but the comedic parts disappointed me. At the end, I thought, 'Huh?'
Now, that may sound like I really dislike the movie. I really don't. I even own the DVD although I haven't watched it in years.
But I own it because I can appreciate the scary parts, and also get some humor from the comedic parts, now that I know what the movie is like.
Hope that answered some of your questions. Cheers.
I don't mean to be rude, but I wonder why you put 'Is It Worth A Watch?' in your post title, then say you won't be back until you watch it. How is anyone supposed to answer?
I'll just say, yes I've seen it several times.
Although I've heard about it for years, I've never seen the movie. Now I'm curious. But it's the plot and characters I'm interested in the most. The gore I've heard about...well, I suspect that, as gory as I've heard it is, it might be very 1969.
I remember the reviews at the time (the live ones shown on TV) were terrible. And most were blamed on Cybill Shepherd. It seemed everything Shepherd and Bogdanovich were doing were trashed just because of their relationship by that point.
I've never seen the film, but I've always been interested in seeing it because I always felt it could fall into the 'so bad, it's good' category. The clips that were shown during the reviews showed some pretty terrible singing.
Oh, I don't disagree that the opening shots of Psycho zero in on a particular spot that seems to indicate 'Here's where it all starts'. Given what he had to work with, Hitch established that perfectly.
Or that the second-unit stuff is very functional. Of course, there's that shot of Christmas decorations in the street in December after Cassidy has declared 'It's as hot as fresh milk! You girls oughtta get your boss to air-condition you up. He can afford it today!'
My sister lives in Santa Cruz. About an hour's drive (60 miles or so) south of SF. I was there years ago, but had no knowledge that Hitch had a home there. If I'd known, I would have gone by his address. (Although I've looked it up on Google Maps, and there's not much visible from the street). San Juan Bautista is about 35 miles south of her. She's been there. I haven't.
It's kind of funny. Living in and around an area so rich in movie history, she really hasn't visited many locations at all.
I don't know, ecarle. I don't associate the two sweeping shots. BECAUSE in Vertigo, the shot comes approximately halfway through the movie, and is shown solely to demonstrate the passage of time. We already know the story takes place in SF. The actors have already been filmed all over the city, and continue to be so after that shot. Vertigo is full of San Francisco.
The sweeping shot of Phoenix in Psycho is at the beginning, and is only an establishing shot. And it depends on dissolves. I realize this is a limitation of the technology (and probably budget) available for Psycho, but I don't think the two are related.
And the only other actual shots of Phoenix are, as you say, second unit.
In the remake, there were two things I noticed about that opening shot when I saw it. One, the helicopter was reflected in a high rise building. And two, as I recall, there was ONE car driving up the street. At 2:43 p.m. in a busy city like Phoenix? The amount of traffic was more realistic in the original.
I should have mentioned that they really didn't see many Hitchcock films. They knew Psycho the best. They laughed at Tippi
Hedren, thought The Birds was silly and Marnie was terrible.
Didn't like Kim Novak in Vertigo and thought John Gavin was terrible in Psycho. Let's just say they were very judgmental when it came to acting.
OK, I'll say it anyway. As a kid I watched NxNW with my father. At least part of it. When it got to the part in the car when Cary Grant said, 'Well, don't tell me where we're going, SURPRISE me', dad said, 'What a terrible actor' and walked away from the set. My parents thought most actors in Hitch's movies were bad.
How do you get around these narrowing replies?
An Unlocked Window is on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLxhz4A4Vp4
Interesting. I recently saw Deliverance for the first time since it was released, and I thought he gave a sub-par performance. I thought he was too Actor-y, not natural at all.
Hitchcock: Frenzy: Bob Rusk lures Babs Milligan to his flat, taking her up the stairs and saying "You're my type of woman" before entering the flat with her as the camera retreats back DOWN the stairs. One take, one camera movement(well actually two -- there's a hidden cut from inside to outside the building.)
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For all the accolades that Frenzy got, after all the good reviews I read, I can tell you that when I saw it on a first run in NYC (I know I keep saying that, but back then most movies premiered in large cities before they moved on, and I lived close by), it played to a mostly empty theater.
And one of the biggest groans from the audience was that we DIDN'T get to see Babs' murder. This is Hitchcock! We're supposed to see the murders! He copped OUT!
I think most people had Psycho and The Birds stuck in their minds, i.e., Hitchcock made gory thrillers and that was it.
Similar to Family Plot. Which played to a packed house. Comments afterwards were things like 'It was Okay but I was expecting at least ONE gory murder!'
Incidentally, that 'break' in the film between the studio set to the actual outside wasn't noticed in Frenzy. I think it goes back to what I said about things just looking more realistic when they were projected on film, in lower resolution. Now, when you see it on DVD, even the colors look different. It LOOKS like a jump cut.
Jackie Brown is my favorite QT , and though people get killed in it, it is easily his least violent, least "sick" film.
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Like I said, I love that movie.
I worked with a woman who really liked QT's movies. I recommended this movie to her. Next time I saw her I asked her how she liked it. She said she turned it off within 15 minutes. I asked her why.
'The LANGUAGE!!!'
Are you kidding me? That's what offended you, after Pulp Fiction?
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To bring this back around (somewhat) to Hitchcock.
I always loved his scenes of cutting between objective/subjective camera shots. For example, the scenes in Vertigo when James Stewart follows Kim Novak.
In Jackie Brown, I loved two long scenes in particular. One was the first 'test transfer' of the money in the mall. Then the longer 'real transference'. Which was shot from several different points of character's views.
The amount of planning, filming and cutting that has to go into scenes like that kind of fascinates me. And they're always fascinating to watch.
Eh. The shower scene was hacked to pieces (no pun intended). Arbogast's murder, I remember hearing the next day in the school yard as 'looking like a leaf floating down'.
The biggest shock was mother's skull face. THAT was what everyone was talking about.
You said you just walked right in to see Pulp Fiction. That wouldn't have been possible with Psycho, given its marketing campaign of having to wait till the next showing before being admitted. Which no doubt added to the excitement of what people would see, in addition to what they'd heard about it. Come on, NOBODY told about the shower scene? Everybody wanted to see it. I remember relatives talking about that, too.
'Hitchcock' was released in 2012? Damn, time's really passing, isn't it? I'm not getting older, Anthony Hopkins is ;)
Its hard to put one's finger on why its such a "pull" to wish we could have been there. Perhaps to see something the very first time it made an impact?
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ecarle, I think we're of the same age. Of the films you mentioned though, I saw them at very different ages.
Star Wars I saw on its RE-release. I wasn't interested when it was first released. I thought the special effects (for the time) were cool. That was about it. Maybe that started my aversion to slam-bang special effects movies, unless the effects are necessary. Once was good enough.
The best movie for me of that period was CARRIE.
Jaws scared the hell out of me. I've read many times about how Spielberg had to improvise during the attack scenes, because 'Bruce', the mechanical shark, didn't really perform. But it worked for the better.
The Godfather I've only seen once in my life. Some are surprised by that. The only three scenes I remember (even if I have these right) are the horse's head in the bed, Sonny getting bulldozed by bullets, and a closing shot of Diane Keaton. Maybe someday I'll watch it again, but as of yet there's no pull.
I saw Pulp Fiction once, and I hated it. The only reason I saw it is because I ordered the film Jackie Brown (which I loved), and Pulp Fiction came with it as a second feature.
I was born only a couple years after Psycho was released. And the first time I saw it was when it was heavily edited for TV (we've talked about that). But I remember hearing talk about it for years. From my parents, their friends, other relatives.
The lines were around the block! Everyone was screaming and hiding their eyes during the shower scene! The film suddenly turned to color so you could see the blood in the shower!
So the build-up led me to be frightened by the film even before I first saw it in it's highly edited form.
The church which seemed to be high on the hill of a sleepy northern California town in The Fog was actually a small church on the corner of a heavily populated neighborhood.
Aaah. The magic of movie making.
I watched the Making Of and honestly I don't have much to add. ecarle, you covered it all.
I did like the story Devane told about picking that piece of lint off the man's lapel. I'm glad HE decided to keep that in. I often find it's little pieces of acting that add to a performance. Although I love Hitch, I feel many of his earlier films were too 'stage-y.' Then again, those were the times.
One thing I did appreciate was the discussion of one of my favorite shots from the film.
It's the tracking high shot of Bruce Dern following Mrs. Maloney through the cemetery. One take, with Maloney trying to avoid him while he cuts through the paths to trap her. It looks sort of like a human Pac-Man.
I'd love to know where that cemetery is, even though I'm sure it's changed.
Something I'll tell you about myself: I'm very interested in researching locations of where scenes from movies were filmed. Of course we all know what can be accomplished with different lenses, camera angles, etc. but sometimes it's very surprising.
For example, the cemetery next to the church at Mission Delores in Vertigo. True, it doesn't look huge in the film, but in reality it's very small. With a very narrow street behind it, barely more than an alley, with apartments on the other side.
And a good one: I've only seen Mulholland Drive once, but I loved the Hitchcock-ish scene of Naomi Watts and the other woman walking through what seemed like a maze of walkways through a kind of funky apartment complex. I thought it was very 'Vertigo'. They went in this direction, then that, etc.
That apartment complex exists, but it's TINY. With very few walkways and buildings. The scene was accomplished by having the actresses walk around the same corners over and over again from different angles, but changing the background with different fake trees, flowers and shrubs.
I have too many DVD's. Cabinets, shelves, drawers. I just looked through them and saw I have Family Plot. I'd forgotten that. And it's the Blu-Ray. Of course I watched it.
Karen Black was listed first (in the END credits) but Barbara Harris stole the picture.
The thing I wanted to comment about is the special effects. Specifically, the rear projection. Of course it looked terrible, but it reminded me of something.
When movies were released to theaters, on film, the effects weren't so obvious. I saw it in the theater. The scene where their car is careening down the hill, brake line cut, wasn't nearly as fake looking and I remember had the audience in hysterical laughter. Mostly because of Harris' physical comedy.
Likewise, for example, the scene in The Birds where the children are chased from the school, it looks so fake. You can actually see THROUGH some of the crows. I remember watching it once with a couple friends and they laughed about it.
I was barely born when The Birds was released, but I grew up seeing it occasionally on TV. Back before DVD, Hi-Def, when regular televisions had standard definition.
It looked real.
I used to be in the advertising business when clients would give us the worst photos possible to print and expect us to turn them into works of art. Sure, we could improve upon them, but the more resolution added, all it did was sharpen the imperfections.
We had a saying. 'You can't shine shi!t'
After all this speechifying, what I'm getting at is...what looks unrealistic now, looked perfectly fine then.
I saw there's a 48 minute 'Making Of' Family Plot after the film. Not up to watching it now, but I will. If there's anything interesting, I'll post it for those who are interested.
I mentioned that I really liked Barbara Harris in 'Peggy Sue Got Married'.
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(She had some outta nowhere admonition to her daughter about sex that I recall taking the audience by storm with laughs.)
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As I recall, they were on the stairs discussing Peggy's boyfriend. Barbara said, shaking her fists and imploring:
'Peggy, you know what a penis is...STAY AWAY FROM IT!'