Thoughts from the committee
How can one summarise everything that Vertigo means? Unparalleled in Hitchcock’s career for its depth and complexity, this powerful meditation on obsession and identity has inspired critics, theorists and audiences for decades.
Detective ‘Scottie’ Ferguson (James Stewart) is pulled out of medical retirement to follow an old friend’s wife, Madeleine Elster (Kim Novak). Madeleine has been acting strangely, and her husband believes she might be possessed. What seems like a simple case rapidly spirals into a series of reversals and intrigues as Scottie becomes increasingly preoccupied with one question: just who is Madeleine, really?
Despite being shot in vivid Technicolor, critics have argued for years whether Vertigo is actually a film noir. Its story and themes certainly would suggest so. Vertigo booted Citizen Kane from the top spot in the Sight and Sound polls in 2012, and has inspired tours of its San Francisco locations, countless books and articles, and even a full stock-footage recreation in the form of Guy Maddin’s The Green Fog. In doing so, it has itself become an object of fascination for thousands.
Wellington Film Society welcomes you to join the obsession, and cap off another wonderful programme of films.
“In its dark heart, the film is a sorrowful contemplation of love and the veils that manipulate sexual passions. It is a taste of romantic obsession, of flirtation and deceit. And it is a cold rumination on voyeurism, the heart-racing but somehow twisted excitement people feel when they spy on others. Aren’t moviegoers voyeurs?” – Peter Stack, The San Francisco Chronicle