Hitchcock (2012) Directed by Sacha Gervasi. Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Helen Mirren & Scarlett Johansson. IMDB says: “A love story between influential filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock and wife Alma Reville during the filming of Psycho in 1959.”
This year featured a duel of Hitchcock biopics. HBO’s film The Girl starring Toby Jones as Alfred Hitchcock and Sienna Miller as one of his leading blondes, Tippi Hedren, during the making of The Birds. Hitchcock starring Anthony Hopkins in the titular role alongside Helen Mirren as his wife Alma Reville during the making of Psycho. The first chose to focus on Hitchcock’s womanizing and controlling nature in an entirely negative depiction, while the second on his relationship with his partner in love and work. As someone who loves the guy for the art he produced while turning a blind eye (out of mostly my own lack of investigation) to his negative side I was much more interested in Hitchcock. Ignorance is bliss, right? Well, not quite. I hate the hell out of Chris Brown who I’m not a fan of but give a free pass to those I admire? That’s not really fair at all (not that I’m ever going to give Brown a free pass, let’s be real). Luckily, I got to watch this movie and take the good sides of him and the bad presented in the lightest of sugar coating. I can have the enduring image of the man I respect artistically while acknowledging his assorted failings at being a decent human at times. Hitchcock gave me both.
Hitchcock chooses to focus on the sometimes tumultuous marriage of the director and Alma Reville. She was his most trusted critic when it came to his work and she, mostly without credit, contributed greatly to his films in the script and editing process. Being in the shadow of the man she’d help make successful along with his obsession with his lead actresses strained their marriage, and according to this film seemed to come to a head during the filming of Psycho. Running concurrently with their relationship troubles was Hitchcock’s aging career, where naysayers in Hollywood believed he couldn’t do anything wildly unexpected or fresh anymore in his films. The making of Psycho was a rough journey because no studio really wanted to back the idea, but fortunately his clout and own wealth made it possible.
I found myself reveling in the depiction of the actual filmmaking throughout the movie. The scenes that shined the most were Hitchcock talking to others in the business, be it the actresses or studio heads, and when he was actually on set. You get to see the filming of several key scenes and it was the highlight of the movie for me. The relationship part wasn’t nearly as interesting but Hopkins and Mirren make it engaging because of their performances. They had fantastic chemistry and were completely convincing as a couple who’d been married for decades.
It was mostly just fun to see the other actors and actresses playing the classic stars in Psycho, but Scarlett Johansson and Jessica Beil don’t exactly get that much to work with as far as big emotional moments. They suit just fine. The astounding performance of this movie is Anthony Hopkins without a doubt. I would easily argue that his performance as Hitchcock is every bit as transformative and authentic as Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln, and certainly more fun to watch. You don’t even see Hopkins—you are watching Hitchcock himself as he directs the hell out of his actors (while shamelessly admiring them lustfully), gluttonously satisfies his vices of food and alcohol, and quips with great wit.
This movie might have been a favorite of mine of the year if it had focused more on the filmmaking of Psycho specifically and let the marriage woes take a backseat. Although the movie slows when it takes the time to address the marriage, luckily it doesn’t suffer too much from the less entertaining personal struggles . Perhaps the best parts of the movie were even the scenes where Hitchcock and Alma were really working closely together on the film. Watch this movie (maybe with a grain of salt) but I think you’ll enjoy it.
FTS SCORE: 75%
Hitchcock is in select theaters now.