Well, I looked at my tape of Spellbound, and I must have made a mistake. They rearranged the cable lineup, and I taped the wrong channel. Sorry. :-(
I did watch The 39 Steps, though. It was good, though I prefer movies that aren't so old (1930s). The audio is usually pretty bad, and I just prefer stuff that's a bit more recent. I liked the way the guy and the girl hated each other's guts until the moment they managed to separate their handcuffs, then they suddenly loved each other. That must be Hitchcock poking fun at marriage. ;-) There was another joke in there that I would have never gotten if someone hadn't explained it to me. That was the Scottish farmer character, who was always quoting the Bible, yet at the same time was a real money-grubber. That was Hitchcock's jab at the Scottish and Bible-thumpers.
I also watched Psycho. I had seen parts of it as a kid, but not all of it. Wow, what a brilliant movie! I now see why the shower scene was so scary - it was because it was totally unexpected. One didn't expect violence from either the "invalid mother" or the bashful Norman Bates. The scene in which Bates and the girl have their long conversation was awesome. The dialogue is especially good if you have seen the movie before, and know that when Bates is talking about his mother he is really referring to the dark side of his schizoid personality. That's definitely a movie worth seeing more than once.
Next up is The Birds, though with March Madness here, I might not have time for a few weeks. ;-)
Tom |
