Compelling, haunting masterpiece

Rating: 10/10 (18 March 2013)

Vertigo affected me so strongly the first time I saw it. I was absolutely mesmerized with it and obsessed with Kim Novak (I was perhaps 11 or 12 at the time). It is the first film that really affected me like that, and it hasn't lost any of its power since.
I think the real genius of this film is that Hitchcock is able to draw you in so completely to Scottie Ferguson's obsession with Madeline Elster. You are right their with him: you feel his initial fascination, his attraction building toward obsession, the full tragedy of his loss, and then the shock of his seeing Judy Barton for the first time and his obsession with making her over into Madeline, then the devastation of the final climactic scene!
Hitch masterfully combined the everyman qualities of Stewart with the exotic magnetism of Novak. Once he had the two of them on set together, all he had to do was mine the abundant gold nuggets that just kept coming from those two.
This film leaves me breathless and craving more every time I see it.