Table Of Content

Hitchcock’s Moral Gaze Also in the series William Rothman, editor, Cavell on Film J. David Slocum, editor, Rebel Without a Cause Joe McElhaney, The Death of Classical Cinema Kirsten Moana Thompson, Apocalyptic Dread Frances Gateward, editor, Seoul Searching Michael Atkinson, editor, Exile Cinema Paul S. Moore, Now Playing Robin L. Murray and Joseph K. Heumann, Ecology and Popular Film William Rothman, editor, Three Documentary Filmmakers Sean Griffin, editor, Hetero Jean-Michel Frodon, editor, Cinema and the Shoah Carolyn Jess-Cooke and Constantine Verevis, editors, Second Takes Matthew Solomon, editor, Fantastic Voyages of the Cinematic Imagination R. Barton Palmer and David Boyd, editors, Hitchcock at the Source William Rothman, Hitchcock: The Murderous Gaze, Second Edition Joanna Hearne, Native Recognition Marc Raymond, Hollywood’s New Yorker Steven Rybin and Will Scheibel, editors, Lonely Places, Dangerous Ground Claire Perkins and Constantine Verevis, editors, B Is for Bad Cinema Dominic Lennard, Bad Seeds and Holy Terrors Rosie Thomas, Bombay before Bollywood Scott M. MacDonald, Binghamton Babylon Sudhir Mahadevan, A Very Old Machine David Greven, Ghost Faces James S. Williams, Encounters with Godard William H. Epstein and R. Barton Palmer, editors, Invented Lives, Imagined Communities Lee Carruthers, Doing Time Rebecca Meyers, William Rothman and Charles Warren, editors, Looking with Robert Gardner Belinda Smaill, Regarding Life Hitchcock’s Moral Gaze • Edited by R. Barton Palmer, Homer B. Pettey, and Steven M. Sanders Cover: Publicity still from Alfred Hitchcock’s I Confess (1953). Courtesy of Warner Bros. and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Published by State University of New York Press, Albany © 2017 State University of New York All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher. For information, contact State University of New York Press, Albany, NY www.sunypress.edu Production, Eileen Nizer Marketing, Fran Keneston Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Palmer, R. Barton, 1946– editor. | Sanders, Steven, 1945– editor. | Pettey, Homer B., editor. Title: Hitchcock’s moral gaze / edited by R. Barton Palmer, Steven M. Sanders, and Homer B. Pettey. Description: Albany : State University of New York Press, [2017] | Series: SUNY series, horizons of cinema | Includes filmography. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016031494 (print) | LCCN 2016048537 (ebook) | ISBN 9781438463858 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781438463865 (e-book) Subjects: LCSH: Hitchcock, Alfred, 1899–1980—Criticism and interpretation. Classification: LCC PN1998.3.H58 H5755 2017 (print) | LCC PN1998.3.H58 (ebook) | DDC 791.4302/33092—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016031494 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Contents Illustrations vii Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 R. Barton Palmer and Steven M. Sanders Skepticism 1. Jealousy and Trust in The Lodger 23 Graham Petrie 2. Fun with Suspicion 37 Thomas Leitch 3. Heroic Satans and Other Hitchcockian Heresies 59 Nick Haeffner 4. “Guilt, Confession, and . . . Then What?”: The Paradine Case 75 and Under Capricorn Brian McFarlane 5. The Forgotten Cigarette Lighter and Other Moral Accidents 91 in Strangers on a Train George Toles Immorality 6. Hitchcock’s Immoralists 117 Steven M. Sanders vi Contents 7. Hitchcock the Amoralist: Rear Window and the Pleasures and Dangers of Looking 133 Sidney Gottlieb 8. Voyeurism Revisited 151 Richard Allen Moralizing 9. Alfred Hitchcock as Moralist 173 Murray Pomerance 10. The Deepening Moralism of The Wrong Man 193 R. Barton Palmer 11. Hitchcock and the Philosophical End of Film 211 Jerold J. Abrams Moral Acts 12. The Dread of Ascent: The Moral and Spiritual Topography of Vertigo 237 Alan Woolfolk 13. The Philosophy of Marriage in North by Northwest 253 Jennifer L. Jenkins 14. “The Loyalty of an Eel”: Issues of Political, Personal, and Professional Morality in (and around) Torn Curtain 271 Neil Sinyard 15. Hobbes, Hume, and Hitchcock: The Case of Frenzy 287 Homer B. Pettey Bibliography 309 Alfred Hitchcock Selected Filmography 317 Contributors 319 Index 323 Illustrations Figure 0.1 I Confess—Alma Keller (Dolly Haas) in moral crisis during the Logan trial. 6 Figure 0.2 Father Logan (Montgomery Clift) with the dying Otto Keller (O.E. Hasse). 14 Figure 1.1 Flashing sign, The Lodger. 29 Figure 1.2 The Lodger—Joe’s (Malcolm Keen) jealousy. 33 Figure 2.1 Suspicion—glass of milk. 42 Figure 3.1 Shadow of a Doubt—the world is a foul sty. 69 Figure 4.1 Paradine Case—Judge Gay (Charles Laughton) advances. 79 Figure 4.2 Under Capricorn—anguish and atonement. 84 Figure 5.1 Strangers on a Train—Bruno (Robert Walker) with Guy’s (Farley Granger) cigarette lighter. 94 Figure 5.2 Bruno’s fingers and the lighter. 111 Figure 6.1 Hitchcock with Rope cast. 121 Figure 7.1 Rear Window—Jefferies (James Stewart) in anguish. 134 Figure 7.2 Jefferies falls. 134 Figure 8.1 Lisa (Grace Kelly) and Jefferies (James Stewart) watching. 161 Figure 8.2 Miss Lonely Hearts (Judith Evelyn). 168 Figure 9.1 The Man Who Knew Too Much—fake Draytons. 185 Figure 10.1 Manny (Henry Fonda) at the Insurance Office. 199 vii viii Illustrations Figure 11.1 The Birds—birds as theater audience members. 231 Figure 12.1 Midge (Barbara Bel Geddes) leaving sanitarium. 241 Figure 13.1 Eve (Eve Marie Saint) walking down the train “aisle.” 259 Figure 13.2 Thornhill (Cary Grant) and the new Mrs. Thornhill in their berth. 268 Figure 14.1 Torn Curtain—blackboard scene. 275 Figure 15.1 Frenzy—Rusk’s (Barry Foster) flashback post-murder. 293 Figure 15.2 Oxford’s (Alec McCowen) aural flashback of Blaney’s (Jon Finch) cries of innocence. 294 Acknowledgments R. Barton Palmer recognizes those fellow students and faculty, members of the Dartmouth College Film Society in 1964–1965, who spared neither time nor expense in mounting the first American retrospective of the films of Alfred Hitchcock, which was complete save for those then unavailable for exhibition. To an eighteen-year old undergraduate, the experience in the Hopkins Center theater, week after week, was more than enlightening and gave rise to a life-changing enthusiasm. Homer B. Pettey would like to thank his friend and fellow admirer of Hitchcock, the late crossword genius Merl Reagle; his pals in crime, Carter Burwell and Chip Johannessen, who continually open his eyes to the magic of the industry; and especially to the loved ones who make his life better, Jennifer and Melissa. Steven M. Sanders thanks his parents, Herb and Ruth Sanders, for bringing him and his sister Lynn to the Gables Theatre to see Vertigo, best friend Mike Stephans for sharing in the horror at the Trail Theater screening of Psycho, and his wife Christeen for aiding and abetting (to say nothing of abating) numerous viewings of Hitch’s films. ix