Apparently the film that Hitchcock wanted to make was Les Yeux Sans Visage (Eyes without a face), but George Franju beat him to it, so Hitchcock made Psycho instead.
If you like Hitchcock I can really recommend Les Yeux Sans Visage. You can watch it just for the horror (which is superb) or for the very clever underlying political metaphor about De Gaulle and Algeria as well - either way it's a great film. Franju is a really weird director - look at Judex too. Another great Hitchcockian-but-wholly-original French film that I recommend is Les Diaboliques, by Clouzot (famous for the controversial Le Courbeau). Another political metaphor, and a great horror film, with the added and rather unexpected bonus of a policeman played by Charles Vanel who is very clearly the inspiration for Peter Falk as Colombo. The Hitch connections in the film are that the bathroom murder scene apparently inspired him to make Psycho, and the novel that Clouzot adapted was written by Boileau-Narcejac, who also wrote the novel that Hitchcock turned into Vertigo. The political metaphor of Les Diaboliques is quite contemporary. The bathroom scene is intended to bring to mind the use of water-boarding by the French in Algeria. The same French torturers were later hired by the USA to teach their 'robust interrogation techniques' in Vietnam, and from there it developed into its more recent use. Don't watch the American remake though - foreign remakes always seem to miss the point about French films. B > -----Original Message----- > From: PDML [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Mark Roberts > Sent: 22 November 2012 01:08 > To: Pentax-Discuss Mail List > Subject: OT: Alfred Hitchcock movies > > Last night we went to see a double feature at the Brattle Theatre in > Cambridge (right across the river from Boston): "Psycho" and > "Hitchcock" (the new biopic about Alfred Hitchcock). Everyone knows the > former is brilliant, not to mention being a must-see for anyone > interested in lighting and photography. The latter is brand new and a > must-see for anyone interested in Alfred Hitchcock. The film isn't > about Alfred Hitchcock per se as much as about the relationship between > Hitchcock and his wife Alma Reville, who was as much a creative partner > as a spouse, and it all takes place during the making of Psycho. Great > writing and terrific acting performances all round. > Highly recommended. (I also recommend that you rent Psycho and watch it > before going to see Hitchcock.) -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
