On this day in movie history – Vertigo (1958 movie & books)

Vertigo

directed by Alfred Hitchcock,

written by Alec Coppel and Samuel Taylor,

based on the novel D’entre les morts,

translation: From Among the Dead, by Boileau-Narcejac (Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac),

was released in the United States on May 28, 1958.
Music by Bernard Herrmann.

Cast:

James Stewart, Kim Novak, Barbara Bel Geddes, Tom Helmore, Henry Jones, Raymond Bailey, Ellen Corby, Konstantin Shayne, Lee Patrick, David Ahdar, Isabel Analla, Jack Ano, Margaret Bacon, John Benson, Danny Borzage, Margaret Brayton, Paul Bryar, Boyd Cabeen, Steve Conte, Jean Corbett, Bruno Della Santina, Roxann Delman, Harry Denny, Molly Dodd, Bess Flowers, Raoul Freeman, Joe Garcio, Joanne Genthon, Kenneth Gibson, Don Giovanni, Roland Gotti, Victor Gotti, Fred Graham, Robert Haines, Buck Harrington, Alfred Hitchcock, Jimmie Horan, Art Howard, Catherine Howard, June Jocelyn, Perk Lazelle, John Marlin, Miliza Milo, Lyle Moraine, Forbes Murray, Julian Petruzzi, Ezelle Poule, Kathy Reed, William Remick, Jack Richardson, Jeffrey Sayre, Nina Shipman, Dori Simmons, Ed Stevlingson, Sara Taft.

Recommended reading:

D’entre les morts

translation: From Among the Dead

By Boileau-Narcejac (Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac).

Filmed as Vertigo (1958), directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

Published by Pushkin Vertigo.

First published 1954.

ISBN-10: 1782279741

ISBN-13: 978-1782279747

Description:

In World War II-era Paris, a troubled-ex policeman is entangled in a web of deceit and lies when he investigates a woman’s strange behavior.

Flavières doesn’t really want to investigate his old’s friend’s wife, but he doesn’t feel he has much of a choice. Madeleine has been behaving strangely, and her husband wants answers – answers that she isn’t willing to give him.

As WWII rages around him, Flavières is drawn into an obsessive cat-and-mouse chase across Paris. Soon his intrigue is replaced by obsession and his dreams by nightmares, as he edges towards discovering a dark, terrible secret.

The most celebrated collaboration of a ground-breaking crime-writing duo, Vertigo is the timeless story of morality and revenge, and the inspiration for Hitchcock’s iconic film.

Vertigo

By Charles Barr.

Published by British Film Institute.

Published 2012.

2nd edition.

ISBN-10: 1844574989

ISBN-13: 9781844574988

Description:

Vertigo (1958) is widely regarded as not only one of Hitchcock's best films, but one of the greatest films of world cinema. Made at the time when the old studio system was breaking up, it functions both as an embodiment of the supremely seductive visual pleasures that 'classical Hollywood' could offer and – with the help of an elaborate plot twist – as a laying bare of their dangerous dark side. The film's core is a study in romantic obsession, as James Stewart's Scottie pursues Madeleine/Judy (Kim Novak) to her death in a remote Californian mission. Novak is ice cool but vulnerable, Stewart – in the darkest role of his career – genial on the surface but damaged within.

Although it can be seen as Hitchcock's most personal film, Charles Barr argues that, like Citizen Kane, Vertigo is at the same time a triumph not so much of individual authorship as of creative collaboration. He highlights the crucial role of screenwriters Alec Coppel and Samuel Taylor and, by a combination of textual and contextual analysis, explores the reasons why Vertigo continues to inspire such fascination.

In his foreword to this special edition, published to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the BFI Film Classics series, Barr looks afresh at Vertigo alongside the recently-rediscovered 'lost' silent The White Shadow (1924), scripted by Hitchcock, which also features the trope of the double, and at the acclaimed contemporary silent film The Artist (2011), which pays explicit homage to Vertigo in its soundtrack.

On this day in movie history - The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956):

The Man Who Knew Too Much

directed by Alfred Hitchcock,

written by John Michael Hayes,

based on a story by Charles Bennett and D. B. Wyndham-Lewis,

was released in the United States on May 16, 1956.
Music by Bernard Herrmann.
Song: Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be), performed by Doris Day.

Cast:

Doris Day, James Stewart, Brenda de Banzie, Bernard Miles, Ralph Truman, Daniel Gélin, Mogens Wieth, Alan Mowbray, Hillary Brooke, Christopher Olsen, Reggie Nalder, Richard Wattis, Noel Willman, Alix Talton, Yves Brainville, Carolyn Jones, London Symphony Orchestra, Bernard Herrmann, Covent Garden Chorus, Barbara Howitt, Patrick Aherne, Frank Albertson, Frank Atkinson, Walter Bacon, Frank Baker, John Barrard, Betty Baskcomb, Hyma Beckley, Paul Beradi, Eumenio Blanco, Arline Bletcher, Alexis Bobrinskoy, Lovyss Bradley, Janet Bruce, Naida Buckingham, Clifford Buckton, Barbara Burke, Nora Bush, Peter Camlin, Albert Carrier, Jimmy Charters, Abdelhaq Chraibi, Oliver Cross, Pauline Farr, Harry Fine, Alex Frazer, Wolf Frees, Milton Frome, Leo Gordon, Walter Gotell, Victor Harrington, Sam Harris, George Hilsdon, Alfred Hitchcock, Gladys Holland, Jimmie Horan, George Howe, Allen Jaffe, Philip Johns, Barbara Jones, Harold Kasket, Barry Keegan, Lou Krugman, Anne Kunde, Lloyd Lamble, Anthony Lang, Donald Lawton, Marion Lessing, Carl M. Leviness, Enid Lindsey, Mayne Lynton, Janet Macfarlane, Edward Manouk, Richard Marner, John Marshall, Lewis Martin, Louis Mercier, Lee Miller, Lola Morice, Ralph Neff, Leslie Newport, John O'Malley, Elsa Palmer, Liddell Peddieson, Jean Ransome, Arthur Ridley, Lucile Sewall, Alma Taylor.