Hitchcock's Repeated Compositions

We were discussing the similarity of the technique used in creating these two "trick shots" which reveal simultaneous action from The Man Who Knew Too Much and Vertigo at the WWH Facebook page, and it got me thinking about other images and juxtaposed shots that Hitchcock repeated in his films—kind of like the second Mrs. De Winter's father who liked the paint the same tree over again.

Here are just a few that come to mind:

Of course Hitchcock used stairways so very often, but the framing he used in The Lodger, Blackmail, and Vertigo were strikingly similar.

Designer Saul Bass had a hand in both the Vertigo title sequence and the shower sequence in Psycho, but it was a design that Hitchcock chose in two of his key films.

The Catholic Hitchcock repeated variations of his own Pietà, but the images in The Lodger and Topaz are most similar.

As Hitchcock's films progressed in the 1950s he explored more deeply the frailty of the human psyche. Notice how these two scenes in consecutive films—The Wrong Man and Vertigo—are nearly identical. Here a desperate Manny goes into Dr. Banay's office to ask about Rose's condition. Dr. Banay leans back on his desk, arms crossed, explaining the healing will take time. Later Manny departs, walking away from the camera down the long corridor of the sanitarium. Below, an equally desperate Midge goes into the office of Scottie's doctor and departs down a similar corridor after telling the doctor Mozart isn't going to help.

In each of these scenes from The Wrong Man and Psycho as the discussion turns to someone being institutionalized or being "put someplace", both Rose Balestrero and Marion Crane begin clutching and rubbing an arm.

In both of these scenes from The Man Who Knew Too Much and Topaz, the listener is receiving information he'd probably rather not have heard.

It doesn't matter whether it's the police or a couple of henchmen, on the front steps of your own home or through the lobby of a New York hotel in broad daylight, Hitchcock knew that being taken into a car against your will could be equally frightening and filmed these scenes from The Wrong Man and North by Northwest in much same way.

Then, of course, there's the way Hitchcock filmed kissing scenes, but we covered that already!

John Forsythe Dead at 92 (1918-2010)

I was saddened to learn today of John Forsythe’s death on April 1 at the age of 92. Although he was best know for his work on television, most notably as the voice of Charlie in Charlie’s Angels and as oil tycoon Blake Carrington in Dynasty, to me John Forsythe will always be remembered for his portrayal of Sam Marlow in Hitchcock’s The Trouble with Harry.

Although Forsythe was not a newcomer to film when he was cast by Hitchcock—he’d been in a half dozen films already—there was a freshness he brought to the role that was perfectly suited to the material. As I wrote in Writing with Hitchcock, Sam Marlow is “perhaps the most grounded character in Hitchcock’s work” and for this reason, I feel Forsythe was the better choice than Cary Grant, who had been considered for the role early on by the director.

The Trouble with Harry was very closely adapted from the novel of the same name by Jack Trevor Story, yet Hitchcock and screenwriter John Michael Hayes created one very significant scene which finds no parallel in the source material. In this scene, a millionaire art collector bestows a set of wishes upon Sam as payment for his paintings, and Sam shares the wishes with his newly made friends. Forsythe’s affable quality helps make this one of Hitchcock’s warmest films.

Forsythe would be directed by Hitchcock twice more following The Trouble with Harry, once on television for an episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour titled I Saw the Whole Thing, and in the director’s 1969 feature release, Topaz. Forsythe’s casting, against type, as the judge accused and ultimately guilty of rape in …And Justice for All was another big screen highlight.