Hitchcock's Influences

Sorry I missed last week, but I was in Boston. I'm way behind in my work, so I'm leaving you all with another class essay this week....


The Master of Suspense! As the bearer of this title, Alfred Hitchcock has had an enormous influence on the work of filmmakers today, as well as on many of his contemporaries. But what styles of filmmaking influenced the master himself? Through his involvement with the London Film Society, Hitchcock was introduced to a multitude of filmmaking styles that greatly shaped his work, particularly during the formative years when his first true masterpieces emerged – the British Sound Period.
The influences of German Expressionism, Soviet Constructivism, and Griersonian Documentary manifest themselves in an exceedingly obvious manner in Hitchcock’s dark psychological dramas Blackmail (1929) and Sabotage (1936). The use of subjective point-of-view shots to explore a character’s psyche; montage and juxtaposition of shots; plastic material; and the attention paid to class and economic issues in his lighter comedic masterpieces – The 39 Steps (1935) and The Lady Vanishes (1938) – exhibit the massive influence those three schools of filmmaking exerted on all of Hitchcock’s work.
In The Lady Vanishes, Hitchcock makes extensive use of German Expressionist tendencies by using costume to reveal a character’s mental state. Gradually altering her costume, Hitchcock conveys Iris’ (Margaret Lockwood) transformation from a repressed, love-starved woman to an outspoken woman in love. When she first boards the train, she is wearing a hat, fur coat, dress with a bolero jacket, and a scarf. This excess of clothing represents constraints imposed by society, exemplified by the loveless, but socially acceptable marriage at home to which she is headed. As she begins to voice her own opinions and fall in love with Gilbert (Michael Redgrave), she loses layers of clothing, a subjective representation of her emotional growth and the uncovering of layers within herself. Bumping her head, which sets her journey of self-discovery in motion, results in the removal of her hat. Conversing with Mrs. Froy (Dame May Whitty) in the dining car permanently places her on the road to personal development, demonstrated by the removal of her fur coat. By the end of the film, Iris has gone from “personality to person,” and paralleling this transformation, her clothing has been diminished to an unbuttoned bolero jacket covering a dress.
Both films also exhibit the influence of German Expressionism in lighting and point-of-view shots. In Vanishes, just before Iris passes out, the view of her friends waving on the train platform becomes blurred, begins to spin, and then multiplies into two, then four of the same image within the shot. Using the German Expressionist tenet of subjective point of view, this blurriness and image duplication allows us to understand firsthand Iris’ poor mental state. The lighting in 39 Steps reflects Hannay’s (Robert Donat) psyche. As he stands with the Crofter’s wife listening to the police in the adjacent room, the shadows on the wall behind him form horizontal and vertical bars, emphasizing his current sense of entrapment. Through a subjective use of form, both films show the influence of German Expressionism. Furthermore, their comedic tone illustrates Hitchcock’s ability to successfully integrate these styles to create meaning in any genre.
In their use of montage, juxtaposition of shots, and plastic material, both films also contain distinct influences of Soviet Constructivism. In the opening of Vanishes, the juxtaposition of a shot of the crowded hotel lobby and the chiming cuckoo clock convey the frenzied madness of the situation currently unfolding in the lobby. Both shots alone are relatively meaningless, but with their juxtaposition, Hitchcock allows the audience to create a meaning that was previously nonexistent: the crowd and their demands are “cuckoo,” just as the sounds of the clock deem them to be. In 39 Steps, a montage also creates meaning, manipulating the viewer into feeling Hannay’s sense of panic. Hitchcock cuts rapidly among a series of shots: the front of the train, its whistle, its wheels, Hannay’s face, and the feet of Hannay’s pursuers. Although all of the action in the montage is simultaneous, montage enables the manipulation of time by increasing the actual duration of the process as each individual component is shown one by one. This helps to create suspense and allows us to feel the same concerns as Hannay: will the train leave before his pursuers can catch him? Thus, through the use of Soviet Constructivism in the manipulation of time and meaning, Hitchcock can create both comedic and suspenseful situations – a blend both films expertly achieve.
In Vanishes, the train whistle acts as plastic material or an objective correlative, further evidence for the influence of Soviet Constructivism. Although on its own, the whistle is simply relatively meaningless train machinery; its juxtaposition with particular scenes allows it to become a representation of the mounting frustration and panic within the characters. As Iris searches desperately out the window for some sign of Mrs. Froy exiting the train, the quicker pace of the editing (also a component of Soviet montage) builds with her sense of frustration until it erupts within her, in time with the blowing of the whistle. As an objective correlative, the whistle also serves its true purpose: a warning signal. It blows each time the audience is presented with a clue or information crucial to the story: when Mrs. Froy writes her name on the window (later necessary for proving her existence to Iris), when the patient who will become Mrs. Froy is brought onto the train, and when the name on the window disappears (Iris’ evidence for Froy’s existence along with it).
Finally, the rising popularity of documentary film-making in the early 1930s, most heavily dominated by the works of John Grierson, led to an increasing social realism in narrative film. Hitchcock’s work is no exception to this influence. Indeed, in The 39 Steps, he makes direct reference to the standard subjects of documentary film in the topic suggestions at the political rally, which include the herring fisheries (a topic of a Grierson film) and the idle rich. However, the influence of Griersonian Documentary manifests itself primarily in Hitchcock’s inclusion of topical issues of economic and social class, as well as use of locations. For example, the two cricket-obsessed Englishmen in The Lady Vanishes, in their disdain for the lower classes, act as a form of commentary on class consciousness and the hypocrisy that stems from social standing.
In the opening of 39 Steps, the representation of the raucous, cat-calling audience in the well-known English setting of the music hall also acts as a commentary on the lower classes and their behavior as an audience, specifically when contrasted with Hannay’s subdued reactions. Not only does this scene add a level of realism to the film, evidencing the influence of Griersonian documentary, but additionally, it self-reflexively gives us Hitchcock’s opinion of the “moron masses” component of the audience. Additionally, Hitchcock makes fun of the influence of social realism in his films. Declaring, “I was a poor orphan boy who never had a chance,” Hannay sarcastically constructs a stereotypical past for the murderer Pamela (Madeleine Carroll) accuses him to be. Referencing the use of social and psychological realism within suspense thrillers and tales of murder, Hitchcock emphasizes the influence Griersonian documentary has on his work, while simultaneously satirizing the effects of social realism on story-telling.
Hitchcock, a master of the cinema, drew from other film styles to construct a distinct and unique manner of filmmaking and story-telling. His primary filmic influences were that of German Expressionism, Soviet Constructivism, and Griersonian Documentary, which his work in the British Sound Period evidences. The three styles of filmmaking themselves were rooted in the production of dramatic, contemplative work, but Hitchcock extended their ideas to create meaning in both drama and comedy. While this insinuates an inability to divorce himself from this influence despite a change in style, it more resoundingly places him as an innovator of his form – a title he continued to cultivate throughout his career.
Here's looking at you kid!

-Reel Classic Dame

Copyright Maureen Lenker 2009

Judy Garland:Icon or Star?

I didn't want to abandon my weekly posts, but I'm about to leave for Spring Break. So, I thought I would leave all of you with an essay I wrote for a class last year. Enjoy!

“Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.” Entering the Land of Oz in her blue gingham dress and pigtails, Judy Garland became a star. From that moment on, MGM worked to perpetuate Judy’s image in all of her films as the all-American, authentic, girl-next-door. In the roles of her early career, through the studio’s treatment of Garland as a commodity, Judy wholly fulfills the definition of a star, as defined by Morin in The Stars. However, Garland provides us with a unique case in that her stardom and iconicity do not stem from the same sources. Although Judy was adored for her star persona by audiences of the 1940s and 50s, she has endured as an icon of the dark side of fame, as exemplified by her later film roles. Today, Judy’s star persona remains in the legacy of her films, but modern audiences recognize her as a symbol of lost innocence and the demons that often accompany stardom. Thus, Judy provides us with a rare dichotomy – the immense success of her early career establishing her as a star versus her struggles with addiction and multiple valiant comebacks firmly cementing her as an icon of the tragic, fleeting nature of fame.

To become a star it is necessary to have some modicum of talent or unnamable, unique quality that makes you special in the eyes of the public. Possessing a voice capable of relaying complex emotions through song and a self-effacing sense of humor, she was dubbed “the entertainer of the century” (American Masters). But even beyond the unforgettable voice, Judy still had “mystical electricity” and a “je ne sais quoi you can’t copy that separates real talent from ordinary talent” (American Masters). Her charisma and vocal talent rendered her a star. At the same time, this unidentifiable attribute that propelled her to stardom also pushed her towards a life of tragedy that made her iconic.

In his book on The Stars, Edgar Morin lays out a much more intricately, detailed definition of a star that Judy Garland fully embodied in the first half of her career. Morin states that “the characters of her films infect the star. Reciprocally, the star herself infects these characters” (27). From the Wizard of Oz’s Dorothy to Esther Smith, in Meet Me in St. Louis, to her multiple roles in the Andy Hardy films, Judy was the quintessential All-American girl. MGM’s reluctance to cast Judy in any other type of role reflects the studio’s recognition of Judy’s star persona and their quest to further this image to maintain her appeal. Even when Judy began to take on more adult roles, she still portrayed a naïve, innocent with gumption and authenticity. Also, her specific persona directly correlates with the definition of a star: “The star is pure. . . The star is profoundly good, and this cinematic goodness must be expressed in her private life as well” (Morin 37). Thus, in her continual representation of an innocent, ordinary, girl-next-door, Judy fulfills the requirement of virginal purity and innate decency on-screen.

However, although her goodness on-screen was easily created through her persona, she still needed to express goodness in her private life. The studio, knowing that the star’s “private life is public, their public life, publicity” (Morin 4), sought to perpetuate the innocent, girl-next-door persona within Garland’s off-screen activities. For her to be a true star, she had to embody the girl-next door in her everyday life so that her star persona could become an overriding factor in all aspects of her life. Garland remembers that the “publicity department puts out newspaper stories about you that astonish you, and you begin to wonder who you really are, but you can’t argue with them because the studio is trying to make you a star” (American Masters). Additionally, the studio strove to ensure that Judy’s actions were entirely in keeping with her image to maintain her star status.

Ironically, today Judy’s star has faded, but the tactics used to make Judy a star inadvertently contributed to the problems that directly led to her enduring iconicity. To keep her thin, working, and in the public eye, MGM put Judy on a steady stream of energy, sleeping, and weight pills that laid the basis for her lifelong struggle with drug addiction. Although producers dubbed Judy perfect for the role of Dorothy, she underwent much prodding in hair, make-up, and costuming. Her strict diet, pill regimen, and the derogatory comments made about her appearance, both on and off-screen, seriously depleted her self-confidence leading her further down the path of substance abuse as she tried to cope with her insecurities. When she eloped at nineteen and became pregnant, MGM dubbed this unacceptable for her image and the teenage roles she continued to play. On the advice of the studio, her mother and new husband forced her to get an abortion that emotionally devastated Judy and created a rift in her marriage. The betrayal of the studio, her mother, and the man she had trusted to protect and love her furthered Judy’s insecurities. This combined with the long hours of non-stop work caused Judy to regularly turn to pills to get through the day (American Masters). By starting her addiction to pills and changing her appearance, MGM set out to create an eternal star on-screen and instead produced an enduring off-screen icon.

In MGM’s total control over her life and the molding of her image, Judy also reflects Morin’s idea of the star as commodity. He claims, “The star is a total item of merchandise” (113) in a capitalist system. In packaging Judy in similar roles in multiple films, the studio used Judy as a piece of machinery in a film-making factory. However, in the studio’s disregard for her health and their all-consuming focus on making a non-stop secession of Judy Garland pictures to bring in box office dollars, she acutely felt the strain of only being “seen through money-making eyes” (American Masters). Indeed, upon her release from her contract after her health prevented her from completing a picture, her realization that she only meant money to the studio led to an attempted suicide. Even in her commoditization, the effects of making Judy a star provided life experiences that would make her an icon.

Garland’s obsession with her success as a performer allows her reciprocity of personality and screen image to become a unique part of her iconicity Eventually, Judy began to so fully associate her identity with her roles that she viewed her success as a human being linked to her success as “Judy Garland the performer.” When she was fired from the studios and her television show was canceled, it was like the “cancellation of a person” (American Masters). Requiring affirmation as a performer to feel fulfilled as an individual truly emphasizes how much a star feels connected to their on-screen persona. Essentially, the over-arching persona and the performer become one. Fully representing the reciprocity of screen image and reality, the failure of Judy’s show became a failure of self. She had a “tremendous desire to please,” which translated into earnest and emotional performances that always made her “vulnerability apparent” (American Masters). Correlating directly to the love she sought from all those around her, including her audiences, Judy’s performances conveyed an emotional fragility that stemmed directly from the fragile stability of her own sanity and daily life. Thus, Judy’s performances, particularly in her later films and concerts, helped mold her as an iconic figure because they were direct windows to the inner struggles and pain for which she is often remembered.

In 1950, with an estranged mother, a drug addiction, two failed marriages, and her film career on the skids, Judy was well on her way to becoming the cautionary tale of a child-star destroyed by the perils of early fame. Indeed, it is the sordid details of this tragic life that have led Judy to become an iconic representation of the cost of fame. However, it is her indomitable spirit and relentless perseverance, as illustrated in her countless comebacks that really helped to make her an enduring icon. She was described as “always having come back from something (sufferings and tribulations) and always keeping on coming, no matter what” (Dyer 150). To an extent, her continual need to return from some period of suffering made her the symbol of the comeback itself, particularly because each comeback was always immensely successful. A Star is Born chronicled the exact sort of process that Judy endured as a child to become a star. Rather than giving birth to a star (as the title suggests), the film helped make Judy an icon by serving as her first real comeback and revealing the seamy details and consequences of Hollywood and the star-making process, which she came to represent.

Her continual efforts to return to her former glory despite her constant pain and struggling reflect her adherence to the belief that the show must go on, as so many of her film characters insisted. Indeed, this quality combined with her vaudeville-esque performances led to her being labeled, “Miss Show Business” (Dyer 151). As she has come to represent both the glitzy façade and seamy underside of show business, this label is still relevant in regards to her iconic status today. In the March 28^th issue of Entertainment Weekly, Diablo Cody writes in her column, “The term showbiz. . . has a certain 1940s charm as if it should chiefly refer to productions that involve Judy Garland and/or a trolley.” Judy channeled the collapse of her stardom and the consequent comeback into creating an iconic figure that persists today.

Furthermore, “this come-back, going on, suffering and strength quality could even be read in the performance of the songs” (Dyer 152). Thus, every time she sang she created a mini-comeback for herself as she went on with the show. Two particular songs, “Over the Rainbow” and “Get Happy,” help illustrate this phenomenon. Judy was constantly trying to go “over the rainbow” (American Masters), to get to a magical place where there weren’t any of the troubles that plagued her reality. Her continual quest to forget and conquer her troubles was reiterated in “Get Happy,” a song from her later career. The two songs, coming from different stages of her career, truly emphasize her never-ending fight to triumph over the odds.

Through her multiple comebacks, Judy not only came to represent the dark side of Hollywood, as evidenced in her evermore ravaged appearance, but also the resiliency of the human spirit. In her continual falls from grace and then glorious comebacks, Garland also manages to represent opposite extremes of human nature and emotion. Essentially, she becomes a representative for all of us through her songs. With each comeback, Judy continually reminded audiences of the immense talent that could be lost should she again fall subject to her inner demons. Many performers have paid dearly for fame, but none have come to represent that cost and the full tragedy of its implications as has Judy. Perhaps this is so because in making the comeback part of her iconic status, she continually reminded us exactly what that cost was.

Finally, in her embodiment of the tragic consequences of fame, Garland transferred a key component of her stardom to her iconicity. Because the stars were the result of a rapidly expanding middle-class, “they [were] no longer inaccessible: they [were] mediators between the screen-heaven and earth” (Morin 23). Garland not only lives in the realm of mortality, but “she is not so much a movie star herself as a stand-in for us the audience” (Dyer 167). Judy, in her ordinariness, becomes a direct link between spectator and film. A star is also someone “with whom one can identity” (Morin 83). As the “heroine of the misplaced,” people identified with Judy Garland in a unique way and could associate with the pain and humor in her voice (American Masters). Her ordinary, authenticity was a key factor of Judy’s star persona, allowing audiences to identity and feel as if her character represented exactly how any regular person would act in the same situation. Audiences’ ability to relate to Judy and through her, link to the magical realm of her films contributed to her success as a star. However, this ordinariness, particularly in regards to Judy’s continual struggles with substance abuse, also contributed to Garland’s iconic status. Her recurrent comebacks and ultimate loss to a battle with addiction further allowed people to identity with her problems and her pain, as they experienced similar issues. Additionally, she helped remind people that no star is immune to the weaknesses of human nature, particularly in an environment like Hollywood where such weaknesses are exploited. Thus, in succumbing to her inner demons, Judy reinforced the fact that she is just like the rest of us. Judy’s struggles and ordinariness helped to establish her as an icon of the cost of fame and the exploitative nature of Hollywood and the entertainment industry.

While many of the qualities that made Judy Garland a star transferred to Judy Garland the icon, her enormously different roles as star and icon highlight the immense disparity of stardom and iconicity. Although some icons are directly created from their star personas, it takes more than stardom to become an icon. In Doris Day and Julia Roberts, we see that lovable “girls-next-door” easily come-and-go in films, answering the particular needs of audiences at the time. Although Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears both accurately reflect the tragic consequences of fame and fortune, no one has continually strived as hard to succeed with each performance, nor reminded us of the innocence and beauty lost to Hollywood, like Judy Garland. No other star so ultimately represents the dark side of Hollywood and the cost of fame, and it is this, coupled with her star persona, that has made her an icon. As Garland exemplifies, to achieve iconicity and transcend stardom, one must be unsurpassed in what they represent as an icon. There is a strong, resounding, unique “I” in icon.

Works Cited

"American Masters: Judy Garland, By Myself." Susan Lacy, dir. PBS: 2004.

Cody, Diablo. “Movie Camp.” Entertainment Weekly. 28 March 2008

Dyer, Richard. “Judy Garland and Gay Men.” Heavenly Bodies: Film Stars and

Society. Ed. Ed Buscombe. British Film Institute Cinema Series.

Morin, Edgar. The Stars. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1972.

Here's looking at you kid!
-Reel Classic Dame

The Inherent Likability of Sonny Corleone

Within the Godfather films, Sonny Corleone has always been my favorite character. Having mentioned this to various people over the last month in conjunction with viewing the films in one of my courses, I was surprised to see a pattern emerge. Apart from the few strident feminists who couldn't get past Sonny's womanizing, most everyone I talked to also cited Sonny as their favorite character, and his death as one of the most tragic and agonizing sequences of the film. This puzzled me. With Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro both receiving Oscars for their brilliant work as Vito Corleone and Al Pacino's stellar, star-making performance as Michael, why does Sonny get all the love? Michael is the center of the piece, the tragic hero, the one that audiences are (initially) supposed to identify with. Though some may see Michael as a villain (particularly in the second film), I would argue that he is a tragic hero, like a figure of Greek tragedy doomed by fate, hubris, and societal laws. The film is about (among a myriad of other things) the inevitable downward spiral that is the life of Michael Corleone -- the tragedy of his continually failed attempts at legitimacy and Americanization because of his ethnicity.

Yet, what do people remember, who do they choose as their "favorite" character? Sonny Corleone. But why? What about Sonny makes me like the second film less merely because of the lack of his presence? What makes him inherently likable to so many? After all, he has a lot of qualities that potentially make him unlikeable. He has a terrible temper and is such a hothead that he creates more trouble for his family than he helps protect them. He insists on "going to the mattresses." His temper leads him to approach everything impulsively (and often violently), and he essentially starts a war between the five families. What's more -- he's a shameless womanizer -- regularly cheating on his wife (and even worse, he does it right under his wife's nose at the highly inappropriate setting of his sister's wedding in the family home). He uses women, which should be enough to cause the average person to disdain him. But yet, he is one of the most beloved characters in the saga of the Corleone family. Why?

Well, first, let's start with a given (and a rather shallow point). The young James Caan is undeniably drop-dead gorgeous -- the type that makes girls swoon. From the first moment he appeared on screen, I fell in love with him. And not only does he have a nice face, but he has a wonderfully toned body and biceps that are regularly shown off as Sonny struts around the Corleone house in his wife-beater. For the most part (particularly in films), we like attractive people -- villains are hideous, often disfigured creatures, while heroes get to be the Adonis. Therefore, Sonny's raw sexuality and good looks make him appealing to audiences before he even speaks. Secondly, Sonny is charming. He couldn't be the lothario he is if he wasn't. His smile and demeanor exude such charisma, particularly when he's talking to women, that you can't help but like the guy. He's friendly, funny, and good-looking with charm to spare -- one almost can't help falling in love with Sonny Corleone.

However, those are two rather shallow reasons. As Hitchcock has exhibited in countless films, villains can be attractive and charming too. And charisma and good looks are not enough to inspire the adoration that many fans feels for Sonny -- not to mention, Michael is good-looking and charming, to an extent, so why don't people like him as much as they love Sonny?

This brings us to the crux of the matter. What, I think, makes Sonny so lovable is his ability to feel deeply and the high level of emotion in his life. In a sense, his destructive temper is why we love him -- he is a man who deeply feels everything and this is why he is so quick to anger. Furthermore, this emotionality makes Sonny incredibly human and vulnerable -- it ultimately leads to his death. Sonny's irrational anger is something most of us have experienced at one time in our lives and so we identify with him. Michael frequently seems cold and detached (almost inhuman in his callousness), but Sonny never does -- he throws his heart fully into everything. We see and feel his varied and deep emotions with him, and this is why we love him.

Additionally, these strong emotions lead to an even more admirable quality -- his unswerving love for and devotion to all members of his family. We can't help but love a family man and Sonny is this in the fullest sense of the word (ignoring his rather negligent treatment of his wife). His decision to "go to the mattresses" may be a destructive one, but it stems from his intense anger that arises out of the attack on his father and in essence, his entire family. Thus, his decision may be rather misguided, but we sympathize with him because we recognize the emotionality that comes when one's family is threatened.

I think the best example of Sonny's intense love for his family, and therefore, the best way to sum up the reasoning behind his inherent likability is his treatment of his sister Connie. Sonny loves his sister almost ferociously, and he takes offense with anyone who mistreats her. We see this deep love when he comes to visit Connie and discovers Carlo has been beating her -- he takes her into a strong bear-hug and kisses the top of her head, as he is visibly shaken by this news. Not only does he seek to comfort Connie, but his anger at her mistreatment result in one of the best scenes (in my opinion) in the entire film: he finds Carlo on the street and for lack of better terminology, beats the crap out of him. This is a stunning display of the love he has for his sister, and we all cheer Sonny on in his righteous indignation as Carlo gets what he deserves. Sadly, this behavior leads to Sonny's death as Carlo uses Sonny's protective nature to lure him into a trap. But it doesn't matter -- as we see Sonny leave the Corleone house for the last time to go defend his sister, we already love his character irrevocably knowing that any man who defends his family to the death is a good man (and indeed a better man than Michael who frequently puts power and success before family).

And this image -- of Sonny running out the door barely getting his coat on as he rushes to defend Connie -- this is the reason behind the inherent likability of Sonny Corleone and his legions of adoring fans. Until next time, here's looking at you kid!

-Reel Classic Dame