The relationship between the audience and director is one of the most important in the film business. This essay makes reference to the director Alfred Hitchcock, and his ability to shift his filmmaking process between his films Rear Window (1954) and Psycho (1960), with specific emphasis on themes, mise en scene and sound, to meet the demands of his audience. By applying the lens of Lehman and Luhr’s article on auteurship in film, “Authorship: The Searchers and Jungle Fever”, this essay will define auteurism and get to the root of this relationship. This essay will argue that auteurship is a democratic relationship, whereby the audience is responsible for constructing the auteur, deciding their persona and thus the structure for their future
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From “sophisticated, tasteful suspense”—to “a graphic and bizarre shocker”, Psycho goes to darker places than the voyeurism of Rear Window and the persistent themes of guilt and danger (Lehman and Luhr, 2008; 82). Now the danger is more biological, more immediate, with a pollution of 1950’s America ideologies (CITE). Lehman and Luhr identify three periods in an auteur’s film oeuvre, describing the early period as experimentation with the director’s “preoccupations”, the middle as a complication of these themes, and the late as an elaboration or reduction of the themes (Lehman and Luhr, 2008; 83). Arguably, Rear Window falls into Hitchcock’s middle period, where he establishes sophisticated and subtle suspense, while Psycho falls into his late period where it is almost a caricature of his older work.This shift is not gradual, in fact it is jolting, but it matches a shift in mindset at the …show more content…
For example, the extravagant costumes, particularly in the case of Grace Kelly’s character, reflected the glamor of city life. These costumes also give it a dream-like, romanticized feel that was very in tune with 1950’s American culture, deemed by some, the ‘Happy times’ (CITE). Showing off wealth and appearing too happy can be considered a form of propaganda against communism, which Hollywood was ripe with (CITE). Furthermore, most strikingly of all is the stylized set version of a Manhattan apartment complex, similar to most other films at the time. In fact, some might say it resembles sets of technicolor musicals like that of Singing in the Rain (1952) or West Side Story (1961). Finally, the lighting in Rear Window remained fairly consistent, colourful and stylistic, with a haze that made Grace Kelly radiate when she enters a room. Overall, the mise en scene is well controlled and in tune with the culture of the
From “sophisticated, tasteful suspense”—to “a graphic and bizarre shocker”, Psycho goes to darker places than the voyeurism of Rear Window and the persistent themes of guilt and danger (Lehman and Luhr, 2008; 82). Now the danger is more biological, more immediate, with a pollution of 1950’s America ideologies (CITE). Lehman and Luhr identify three periods in an auteur’s film oeuvre, describing the early period as experimentation with the director’s “preoccupations”, the middle as a complication of these themes, and the late as an elaboration or reduction of the themes (Lehman and Luhr, 2008; 83). Arguably, Rear Window falls into Hitchcock’s middle period, where he establishes sophisticated and subtle suspense, while Psycho falls into his late period where it is almost a caricature of his older work.This shift is not gradual, in fact it is jolting, but it matches a shift in mindset at the …show more content…
For example, the extravagant costumes, particularly in the case of Grace Kelly’s character, reflected the glamor of city life. These costumes also give it a dream-like, romanticized feel that was very in tune with 1950’s American culture, deemed by some, the ‘Happy times’ (CITE). Showing off wealth and appearing too happy can be considered a form of propaganda against communism, which Hollywood was ripe with (CITE). Furthermore, most strikingly of all is the stylized set version of a Manhattan apartment complex, similar to most other films at the time. In fact, some might say it resembles sets of technicolor musicals like that of Singing in the Rain (1952) or West Side Story (1961). Finally, the lighting in Rear Window remained fairly consistent, colourful and stylistic, with a haze that made Grace Kelly radiate when she enters a room. Overall, the mise en scene is well controlled and in tune with the culture of the