Hitchcock | |
---|---|
Directed by | Sacha Gervasi |
Screenplay by | John J. McLaughlin |
Based on | Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho by Stephen Rebello |
Produced by | Ivan Reitman Tom Pollock Joe Medjuck Tom Thayer Alan Barnette |
Starring | |
Cinematography | Jeff Cronenweth |
Edited by | Pamela Martin |
Music by | Danny Elfman |
Production companies | |
Distributed by | Fox Searchlight Pictures |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 98 minutes [2] |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $15 million [3] |
Box office | $27 million [4] |
Hitchcock is a 2012 American biographical romantic drama film directed by Sacha Gervasi and based on Stephen Rebello's 1990 non-fiction book Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho . Hitchcock tells the story of the relationship between Alfred Hitchcock and his wife, Alma Reville, during the filming of Psycho in 1959. Hitchcock premiered at the AFI Fest on November 1, 2012, and was released in the United States on November 23 by Fox Searchlight Pictures. It grossed $27 million against a $15 million budget.
In 1959, Alfred Hitchcock opens his latest film, North by Northwest , to both critical and commercial success, but is troubled by a reporter's insinuation that he should retire. Seeking to reclaim the artistic daring of his youth, Hitchcock turns down film proposals, including Casino Royale and The Diary of Anne Frank , in favor of a horror novel called Psycho by Robert Bloch, based on the real-life crimes of murderer Ed Gein. Gein appears in sequences throughout the film, in which he seems to prompt Hitchcock's imagination regarding the Psycho story or act as some function of Hitchcock's subconscious mind (for instance, drawing Hitchcock's attention to sand on his bathroom floor, the quantity of which reveals how much time his wife Alma has been spending at the beach house with Whitfield Cook).
Hitchcock's wife and artistic collaborator, Alma, is no more enthusiastic about the idea than his colleagues, especially since she is being lobbied by their writer friend, Whitfield Cook, to look at his own screenplay. However, she warms to Hitchcock's proposal, suggesting the innovative plot turn of killing the female lead early in the film. The studio heads at Paramount Pictures prove more difficult to persuade, forcing Hitchcock to finance the film personally and use his Alfred Hitchcock Presents television crew (over at competitor Revue/Universal) to shoot the film, his last under contract to Paramount.
The pressures of the production, such as dealing with Geoffrey Shurlock of the Motion Picture Association of America, and Hitchcock's lecherous habits, such as when they confer with the female lead, Janet Leigh, annoy Alma. She begins a personal writing collaboration with Whitfield Cook on his screenplay at his beach house without Hitchcock's knowledge. Hitchcock eventually discovers what she has been doing and suspects her of having an affair. This concern affects Hitchcock's work on Psycho. Hitchcock eventually confronts Alma and asks her if she is having an affair. Alma angrily denies it.
Alma temporarily takes over production of the film when Hitchcock is bedridden after collapsing from overwork, working on a sequence which included a complicated process shot showing Detective Arbogast's demise, with Alma's specification of a 35 mm lens, instead of the 50 mm lens preferred by Hitchcock for this film.
Meanwhile, Hitchcock expresses his disappointment to Vera Miles at how she didn't follow through on his plan to make her the next biggest star after Grace Kelly, but Miles says she is happy with her family life.
Hitchcock's cut of Psycho is poorly received by the studio executives, while Alma discovers Whitfield having sex with a younger woman at his beach house. Hitchcock and Alma reconcile and set to work on improving the film. Their renewed collaboration yields results, culminating in Alma persuading Hitchcock to accept their composer's suggestion for adding Bernard Herrmann's harsh strings score to the shower scene.
After maneuvering Shurlock into leaving the film's content largely intact, Hitchcock learns the studio is only going to open the film in two theaters. Hitchcock arranges for special theater instructions to pique the public's interest such as forbidding admittance after the film begins. At the film's premiere, Hitchcock first views the audience from the projection booth, looking out through its small window at them. Hitchcock then waits in the lobby for the audience's reaction, conducting slashing motions to their reactions as they scream on cue. The film is rewarded with an enthusiastic reception.
With the film's screening so well received, Hitchcock publicly thanks his wife for helping make it possible and they affirm their love and partnership. At the conclusion at his home, Hitchcock addresses the audience noting Psycho proved a major high point of his career and he is currently pondering his next project. A raven lands on his shoulder hinting at his next motion picture, The Birds .
The final title cards say that Hitchcock directed six more films after Psycho, none of which would eclipse its commercial success, and although he never won an Oscar, the American Film Institute awarded him its Life Achievement Award in 1979: an award that he claimed he shared, as he had his life, with his wife, Alma.
In 2005, it was reported that A&E would produce a television film or miniseries based on Stephen Rebello's book Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho . [5] Subsequently, the book was optioned as a major motion picture. In 2007, the Montecito Picture Company, owned by Ivan Reitman and Tom Pollock, set up a first-look deal with Paramount Pictures, the original distributor of Psycho . However, after four years of development at Paramount, production moved to Fox Searchlight Pictures. [6]
Sacha Gervasi was in negotiations to direct the dramatic motion picture in November 2011. Early the next month, Gervasi signed on as director with Anthony Hopkins and Helen Mirren attached to star as Alfred Hitchcock and Alma Reville, respectively. [6] Black Swan co-writer John J. McLaughlin wrote the first screenplay drafts; subsequently, Rebello wrote additional uncredited drafts that shifted the story's focus away from Ed Gein and instead toward the complex personal and professional relationship of Hitchcock and his wife, Reville, during the filming of Psycho.
Much of the film's casting was announced in March 2012. Scarlett Johansson and James D'Arcy played the stars of Psycho, Janet Leigh and Anthony Perkins. [7] Later that month Jessica Biel was cast as Vera Miles. [8] Additional cast members included Toni Collette as the director's trusted assistant, Danny Huston as screenwriter-playwright Whitfield Cook, Michael Stuhlbarg as powerful agent and studio boss Lew Wasserman, Michael Wincott as serial killer Ed Gein, Ralph Macchio as screenwriter Joseph Stefano, Richard Portnow as Paramount Pictures boss Barney Balaban, and Wallace Langham as graphic designer Saul Bass. [9] [10]
Principal photography for the film began on April 13 in Los Angeles, with the film retitled as Hitchcock. [11] Filming was wrapped up on May 31 after the completion of a scene set during Psycho's New York City premiere on June 16, 1960. [12]
Danny Elfman composed the film's score. [13] Elfman had previously rerecorded Bernard Herrmann's original score to Psycho in 1998 for Gus Van Sant's 1998 shot-for-shot remake. [14]
The soundtrack album to the film was released by Sony Classical on December 14, 2012. [15]
Hitchcock had a limited release on November 23, 2012, for the film to contend during Oscar season. [16] The film had its world premiere as the opening film of AFI Fest 2012 on November 1 with a gala at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. [17] [18]
Hitchcock was released onto DVD and Blu-ray on March 12, 2013, by 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment. The home media releases contain several making-of featurettes as well as a commentary between director Sacha Gervasi and author Stephen Rebello, a deleted scene, and the film's theatrical trailer. [19]
Hitchcock has earned an estimated $24.7 million worldwide. [4] During its opening on Thanksgiving weekend, the film debuted in 17 theaters and grossed an average of $16,924 per theater. [20]
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gives an approval rating of 60% based on 216 reviews and an average rating of 6.19/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "Though it suffers from tonal inconsistency and a lack of truly insightful retrospection, Hitchcock is elevated by inspired performances from its two distinguished leads". [21] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 55 out of 100 based on 40 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". [22]
Soon after the film's world premiere at the AFI Fest 2012, the first reviews of Hitchcock were published. Tom O'Neil of The Huffington Post wrote: "When the film unspooled at AFI Fest on Thursday night, the audience burst into wild huzzahs at the end. This Hitchcock is so well made, so much fun and so suspenseful that it would make the original Hitchcock proud ... It's a serious contender for Best Picture, Lead Actor, Lead Actress, Adapted Screenplay, Makeup, Music Score, and maybe Art Direction". [23] John Patterson of The Guardian called the film "clever and witty"; "the making of Psycho is depicted in detail without our seeing one frame of the completed movie" and concluding "it lives and breathes through Hopkins and Mirren". [24]
Upon its theatrical release, Mary Pols of Time called the film "a feel-good frolic, which is fine for anyone who prefers their Hitchcock history tidied up, absent the megalomania, the condescending cruelty and tendency to sexual harassment that caused his post-Psycho blonde discovery Tippi Hedren to declare him 'a mean, mean man'". [25] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film a positive review and felt that the film depended most on Helen Mirren's portrayal of Alma Reville, which he found to be "warm and effective". [26]
The Atlantic 's Govindini Murty called the film "smart and entertaining" and also provided a cultural guide to the themes, personalities, and cinematic references in the film, from German Expressionism to the paintings of Edward Hopper. [27]
Many critics compared the film to the HBO biopic The Girl , which was released a month earlier and detailed Hitchcock making The Birds and Marnie . Justin Chang of Variety wrote that "the comparatively frothy Hitchcock offers a more sympathetic, even comedic assessment of the man behind the portly silhouette". [28] Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter also made note that the film "brings a measure of authenticity entirely missing from The Girl". When writing about the film as a whole, McCarthy said, "Hitchcock might be a work of fantasy and speculation as much as it is history and biography, but as an interpretation of a major talent's inner life and imagination, it's undeniably lively and provocative". [29]
Award | Category | Recipients | Result |
---|---|---|---|
Academy Awards | Best Makeup and Hairstyling | Howard Berger, Peter Montagna and Martin Samuel | Nominated |
Alliance of Women Film Journalists | Actress Defying Age and Ageism | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
British Academy Film Awards | Best Actress | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
Best Makeup and Hair | Nominated | ||
Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association | Best Actress | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
Golden Globe Awards | Best Motion Picture Actress – Drama | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
Houston Film Critics Society | Best Score | Nominated | |
London Film Critics Circle | British Actress of the Year | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
Phoenix Film Critics Society | Best Actor | Anthony Hopkins | Nominated |
Best Original Score | Danny Elfman | Nominated | |
Saturn Awards | Best Independent Film | Nominated | |
Best Actress | Helen Mirren | Nominated | |
Best Make-Up | Gregory Nicotero, Howard Berger, Peter Montagna and Julie Hewitt | Nominated | |
Screen Actors Guild Awards [30] | Best Actress | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
St. Louis Gateway Film Critics Association | Best Actress | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
Best Scene | Anthony Hopkins in lobby conducting to music/audience’s reaction during “Psycho” shower scene | Won | |
Washington DC Area Film Critics Association | Best Actress | Helen Mirren | Nominated |
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock was an English film director. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 feature films, many of which are still widely watched and studied today. Known as the "Master of Suspense", Hitchcock became as well known as any of his actors thanks to his many interviews, his cameo appearances in most of his films, and his hosting and producing the television anthology Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955–65). His films garnered 46 Academy Award nominations, including six wins, although he never won the award for Best Director, despite five nominations.
Psycho is a 1960 American horror film produced and directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The screenplay, written by Joseph Stefano, was based on the 1959 novel of the same name by Robert Bloch. The film stars Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh, Vera Miles, John Gavin, and Martin Balsam. The plot centers on an encounter between on-the-run embezzler Marion Crane (Leigh) and shy motel proprietor Norman Bates (Perkins) and its aftermath, in which a private investigator (Balsam), Marion's lover Sam Loomis (Gavin), and her sister Lila (Miles) investigate her disappearance.
Norman Bates is a fictional character created by American author Robert Bloch as the main antagonist in his 1959 horror novel Psycho. He has an alter, Mother, who takes from the form of his abusive mother, and later victim, Norma, who in his daily life runs the Bates Motel.
Rear Window is a 1954 American mystery thriller film directed by Alfred Hitchcock and written by John Michael Hayes based on Cornell Woolrich's 1942 short story It Had to Be Murder. Originally released by Paramount Pictures, the film stars James Stewart, Grace Kelly, Wendell Corey, Thelma Ritter, and Raymond Burr. It was screened at the 1954 Venice Film Festival.
Bernard Herrmann was an American composer and conductor best known for his work in composing for films. As a conductor, he championed the music of lesser-known composers. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest film composers. Alex Ross writes that "Over four decades, he revolutionized movie scoring by abandoning the illustrative musical techniques that dominated Hollywood in the 1930s and imposing his own peculiar harmonic and rhythmic vocabulary."
Patricia Alma Hitchcock O'Connell was an English-American actress and producer. She was the only child of English director Alfred Hitchcock and film editor Alma Reville, and had small roles in several of her father's films, with her most substantial appearance being in Strangers on a Train (1951).
Alma Lucy Reville, Lady Hitchcock was an English screenwriter and film editor. She was the wife of film director Alfred Hitchcock. She collaborated on scripts for her husband's films, including Shadow of a Doubt, Suspicion, and The Lady Vanishes, as well as scripts for other directors, including Henrik Galeen, Maurice Elvey, and Berthold Viertel.
Frenzy is a 1972 British thriller film directed by Alfred Hitchcock. It is the penultimate feature film of his extensive career. The screenplay by Anthony Shaffer was based on the 1966 novel Goodbye Piccadilly, Farewell Leicester Square by Arthur La Bern. The film stars Jon Finch, Alec McCowen and Barry Foster and features Billie Whitelaw, Anna Massey, Barbara Leigh-Hunt, Bernard Cribbins and Vivien Merchant. The original music score was composed by Ron Goodwin.
Joseph William Stefano was an American screenwriter, known for adapting Robert Bloch's novel as the script for Alfred Hitchcock's film Psycho, and for being the producer and co-writer of the original The Outer Limits television series.
Alexander Simon "Sacha" Gervasi is a British director, screenwriter and former journalist.
Psycho is a 1998 American psychological horror film produced and directed by Gus Van Sant, and starring Vince Vaughn, Julianne Moore, Viggo Mortensen, William H. Macy, and Anne Heche. It is a modern remake of Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 film of the same name, in which an embezzler arrives at an old motel run by a mysterious man named Norman Bates; both films are adapted from Robert Bloch's 1959 novel.
Psycho is an American horror franchise consisting of six films loosely based on the Psycho novels by Robert Bloch: Psycho, Psycho II, Psycho III, Bates Motel, Psycho IV: The Beginning, the 1998 remake of the original film, and additional merchandise spanning various media. The first film, Psycho, was directed by filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock. Subsequently, another film related to the series was made: an Alfred Hitchcock biopic, and two new novels, by Takekuni Kitayama and Chet Williamson, were released. Also, an independent documentary called The Psycho Legacy was released on October 19, 2010, mostly focusing on Psycho II, Psycho III and Psycho IV: The Beginning, while covering the impact and legacy of the original film.
Alfred Hitchcock (1899–1980) was an English director and filmmaker. Popularly known as the "Master of Suspense" for his use of innovative film techniques in thrillers, Hitchcock started his career in the British film industry as a title designer and art director for a number of silent films during the early 1920s. His directorial debut was the 1925 release The Pleasure Garden. Hitchcock followed this with The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, his first commercial and critical success. It featured many of the thematic elements his films would be known for, such as an innocent man on the run. It also featured the first of his famous cameo appearances. Two years later he directed Blackmail (1929) which was his first sound film. In 1935, Hitchcock directed The 39 Steps; three years later, he directed The Lady Vanishes, starring Margaret Lockwood and Michael Redgrave.
Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho is a 1990 non-fiction book by Stephen Rebello. It details the creation of director Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 thriller Psycho. The 2012 American biographical drama film directed by Sacha Gervasi, based on this non-fiction book is titled Hitchcock. The film was released on November 23, 2012.
Stephen Rebello is an American writer, screenwriter, journalist and former clinical therapist.
The Girl is a 2012 British television film directed by Julian Jarrold, written by Gwyneth Hughes and produced by the BBC and HBO Films. The film stars Sienna Miller as Tippi Hedren and Toby Jones as Alfred Hitchcock. It is based on Donald Spoto's 2009 book Spellbound by Beauty: Alfred Hitchcock and His Leading Ladies, which discusses the English film director Hitchcock and the women who played leading roles in his films. The Girl's title was inspired by Hitchcock's alleged nickname for Hedren.
George Whitfield Cook III was an American writer of screenplays, stage plays, short stories and novels, best known for his contributions to two Alfred Hitchcock films, Stage Fright and Strangers on a Train. He also wrote scripts for several TV series, including Suspense, Climax! and Playhouse 90.
Margaret Robertson was a British script supervisor and personal assistant to Alfred Hitchcock from the 1940s to the 1970s during which time she worked on his films Under Capricorn (1948) and Stage Fright (1950), before joining his team permanently on Vertigo (1958), working thereafter on all of the director's remaining films.
Geoffrey Manwaring Shurlock was an Anglo-American motion picture industry executive who served as Hollywood's chief censor as the Director of the Motion Picture Association of America's Production Code Administration from 1954 to 1969, an era when movie producers demanded more freedom from censorship. During the latter years of Shurlock's reign, the Production Code and its seal of approval that was required by most film exhibitors for a movie to be shown was replaced by the ratings system.
Hitchcock (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) is the soundtrack accompanying the 2012 film Hitchcock directed by Sacha Gervasi. The film's original score is composed by Danny Elfman and released through Sony Masterworks on December 4, 2012. The score featured inspirations from the works of Bernard Herrmann, whom Elfman had been inspired by.
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