People Call Hitchcock One of the Greatest for a Reason

Rating: 10/10 (26 April 2018)

SPOILER FREE REVIEW:
Hitchcock is considered one of history's greatest directors for a reason. Watching through Vertigo one time straight through gives an amazing experience. The characters are intriguing, the plot is suspenseful, and has many twists and turns, like you are falling through spiraling mayhem.
****************************SPOILERS AHEAD*********************************
From the beginning of the film we have one of the greatest opening credits sequences of all time. The close up shots of a face, followed by spinning shapes and spirals. As irrelevant as this credits sequence may seem the first time around, it quite literally delves into the mind of Scottie (James Stewart), our protagonist. The way he perceives Madeline (Kim Novak) is not as a person clearly, but for who she is as an object. He doesn't see her as a full person. That is why from the opening credits, we see features of a woman on there own, separate from the rest of the body. These spirals represent how Scottie feels with the chaos ensuing in his life throughout the film, and his vertigo.

Another brilliant subtle use of imagery in the film is with color. In particular, the colors red and green, for stop and go. The first time I watched the film, this imagery totally went past me. Although I was in a class where the teacher was analyzing the film, and this suddenly became almost too obvious. In nearly every scene featuring Scottie and Madeline/Judy, the colors red and green are very present, whether it be the lighting in the space, their clothing, the wallpaper the room, or even something as simple as a reflection.

The one element I didn't love in Vertigo which many people would disagree with is the ending. I really loved the buildup as Scottie follows Judy up the tower in the final scene, and he slowly builds up in his anger revealing he has caught on to the whole scheme, but I found the very ending bizarre, and was given no good explanation to it. My assumption was at the ending there would be some sort of intense final dialogue between Judy and Scottie at the top of the tower, and Scottie would dramatically either commit suicide, kill Judy, or just something very intense, but the way that Judy dies didn't make much sense to me, or make me feel the film had a satisfying ending. She dies because some nun we've never seen before startles her. Why does this happen and what does it mean? I read somewhere that she thought the nun is a ghost, but why is that relevant? When the movie ended the first time I watched it, I thought to myself, that was weird, although I'm sure I'll find some complex mind blowing explanation online. Nothing. If someone can link me to a great explanation of who that nun is, and what she represents, it would be appreciated.