"I heard voices"--an innocent statement for a great end

Rating: 7/10 (3 April 2006)

Hitchcock films end with interesting statements. Vertigo ends with a nun blandly stating "I heard voices." Then, the bell is tolled. Hitchcock loves to play with words and sounds to stir up the imagination of the viewer. Even when letters are written, Hitchcock, instead of showing the words as a conventional director would, he prefers to let the writer speak out the words that are being written.
This is an unusual Hitchcock film where humor is hardly presentinstead the psychological atmosphere of the film is full of regret, gloom and doom, with death lurking everywhere, while the camera captures the opposite feelingsbright sunny exteriors, lush green dresses, green cars, red robes, spotless white coats. The film harks back to Hitchcock's "Marnie" in subject and treatment as it explores the inherent contradictions in life.
Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde" is adapted by Bernard Herrmann, the music composer, for "Vertigo" in a very effective score that is not far removed from original piece.
I look forward to viewing the film in 70 mm (its new form). This is a fascinating Hitchcock film in lush color with a great ending-but there are equally stunning Hitchcock films that did not rely on color. "Notorious," "Saboteur," and "Blackmail" are three Hitchcock films where "black and white" was equally stunning as the color in "Vertigo"