My Pierre Etaix piece, an epic career overview, is now up at The Criterion Collection website.
The other essays completed for Criterion are also there — STAGECOACH and THE 39 STEPS. But the Etaix is, I think, not only the biggest but the best of the three.
Something for the ladies! A topless action pose from Elia Kazan. Hey, if you want analysis, there’s a very good Kent Jones & Martin Scorsese documentary…
I regret I have failed to uncover a shot of Hitchcock baring his pacemaker scar or his tummy tuck which he claimed to Karen Black robbed him of his navel. Photographic evidence has yet to emerge.
I did however see HITCHCOCK with Anthony Hopkins failing to impersonate the Master. Asides from a well-observed Anthony Perkins by James D’Arcy, and a couple of very nice moments at the end, this struck me as a despicable lie of a film. Fiona was inspired to read the supposed source book by Stephen Rebello, which I read years ago and whose plot I summarized thus: Alfred Hitchcock makes another film. In other words, it lacks all the drama (or let’s face it melodrama) of the movie version (which manages to insult Hitchcock, Welles and Anthony Mann) — but Fiona’s reading has uncovered many nuggets which could have made good scenes and which have all been cast aside in favour of blatant invention and myth-making. The fact that the people making the stories up are so much less skilled at it than Hitchcock is depressing: it seems that the mediocre despise the talented and will bide their time until they can avenge themselves. In the long result of time, the non-talents may seem to get the final say, but if we wait a few years we will find that PSYCHO is still appreciated and this poorly conceived rubbish is quite forgotten.
On a lighter note, two limericks for Christmas, on the festive theme of raving maniacs: 1 and 2.
Got my complimentary disc of THE 39 STEPS from Criterion. If you buy this Blu-ray you will, among other things, be easily able to discern the poster for THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH in the above image, which purports to represent Waverley Station in Edinburgh…
Dan Sallitt is in town for the Edinburgh International Film Festival with his excellent new feature film THE UNSPEAKABLE ACT. By a very weird coincidence my guest Chris Bourton brought with him the Blu-ray of RUGGLES OF RED GAP, which features a fine essay by Mr Sallitt. We watched the movie and enjoyed it. And by an even weirder coincidence, Charles Laughton’s character in the film is referred to (falsely) as a member of the Black Watch regiment, which is based in Edinburgh.
And — new in shops — my essay is attached to the Blu-ray of THE LOST WEEKEND.
Ruggles of Red Gap [Masters of Cinema] (Dual Format Edition) [Blu-ray] [1935]
Shadowplay
