For the Love of FIlm III: Hitchcock's Continuity "Error"

This is my second post in the For the Love of Film: The Film Preservation Blogathon. Watch my video essay on Hitchcock’s influence on Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low here.

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In 2011, the New Zealand Film Archive discovered part of The White Shadow, a film directed by Graham Cutts, and written, edited, and assistant directed by the legendary Alfred Hitchcock. The first three reels of this lost work have been arduously restored, but the film has only had a single public screening. For this year’s For the Love of Film: The Film Preservation Blogathon, we are asking for donations to the National Film Preservation Foundation. If we can raise $15,000, the Foundation will provide free streaming of The White Shadow for four months, and record a new score by Michael Motilla. To donate, simply click here. And for more information on the blogathon, please visit Ferdy on Films, the Self-Styled Siren, and This Island Rod. Every donation counts, and we thank you for your continued support of film.

            Hitchcock’s Psycho has been studied mercilessly to death, but there’s one moment in particular that I haven’t seen many people comment on. It’s a scene that few remember, or at least discuss in detail, where which Sam and Lila visit the Sheriff and his wife and the Sheriff reveals the history of Norman and what not. This scene itself isn’t particularly fascinating—it’s the exposition to get us back to the motel—but there’s something odd in Hitchcock’s filming. The film is shot-reverse shot, as the Sheriff discusses the details. But what’s most perplexing is the placement of the Sheriff’s wife in these shots:

            The sheriff’s wife continually seems to jump around in the frame, appearing in both shots on opposite sides. Her appearance is oddly striking, and her necessity to the scene is nonexistent, but Hitchcock not only keeps her in the scene, but also makes what most would consider a continuity error. But we can’t consider it as such—Hitchcock was meticulous in every frame. He wouldn’t just leave such a mistake in the final product. Would he? 

Video Essay: Dial K for Kurosawa

For my part in the For the Love of Film: The Film Preservation Blogathon, I wrote and edited a video essay together about my favorite Kurosawa film, High and Low, and its unique comparisons to Hithcock. Check it out, and donate to the cause.

White Elephant Blogathon: Dev D

This was my face after the movie finished

Read about the White Elephant Blogathon, hosted by Paul Clark at Silly Hats Only.

            In general, I prefer to know as little as possible before seeing a film. Had I looked up Dev D, my “present” for this year's White Elephant blog, I would have known that it’s a modern adaptation of Devdas, a classic Bengali novel from the early 20^th century. I would have known it was a box office success in its country and hugely popular. It was a critical success as well, and won a number of FilmFare Awards, one of the oldest and most prestigious film ceremony for Hindi language films. Most importantly, I would have known that this laughably and horid film was “serious.”

            Dev D follows a naïve 20-somethings boy named Dev (Abhay Deol) from a wealthy family who is a clearly an idiot, unworthy of our sympathies (which we are asked to do so for over two hours). He thinks he is in love with Paro (Mahi Gill), a childhood friend. Dev was sent off to the UK after causing his father much pain, by not calling him “father” (a detail I’m assuming from the original novel, because to be sent halfway around the country for such impudence is quite the punishment). But he never forgot about Paro, and through the beauty of the Internet, they stay in touch. Plus, Dev is such a good guy that Paro sends him naked pictures (what a gentleman so full of love). So when he returns to Dehli, the two only have one thing on their mind, as one shot of roosters suggests, though the two can never find alone tine.

Amadeus Blogathon - Seeing Music and Haunting Themes: Diegetic and Non-Diegetic Strategies

This is my entry for this week’s critics blogathon on Milos Forman’s Amadeus.You can read about the project by the blogathon's leader, Vulture critic Bilge Ebiri. As the Oscars approach, it was decided by us that Amadeus is one of the great films that deserved the critical praise the film received, as well as its eight Academy Awards. At the end of this blog, you’ll find links to the other pieces in the series.

            There is certainly something sublime about the music of Mozart, even if we can’t understand why it arouses such feelings. Even those of us who have taken a music class at college perhaps don’t truly understand the genius that has made Mozart better known than any other composer in the world. But what if we could understand it from the mind of a great composer? And what if that understanding could be translated cinematically?

            That’s part of the conceit that makes Amadeus, the 1984 Oscar winner from playwright Peter Shaffer and director Milos Forman, a fascinating film, and perhaps one of the best examples in how directors can use music in film. It would have certainly been easy enough for Forman to simply populate the soundtrack of Amadeus­—a quasi-biopic of Mozart as told through the eyes of a jealous rival named Salieri—with the music of Mozart without much thought in why they chose any particularly piece except the emotions felt. However, Shaffer and Forman use the music as specifically a subjective experience and commentary by Salieri. The music cues, both diegetic music (where the spectator can see where the source of the music is originating) and non-diegetic (music that overlay the soundtrack), offer insight both into how the spectator can understand the genius of Mozart and how the film uses Salieri’s knowledge of Mozart to comment and create a narrative of a man haunted by another.