(no subject)
I just watched Hitchcock's Rope. I have no memory of why I put it on my Netflix list besides hearing a long time ago (probably in the Truffaut/Hitchcock book) that it's meant to look like one continuos take. Although that's not completely true, it's worth watching for that effect alone. It's about two friends (who are probably gay) who kill another friend and hide his body in a trunk, then throw a dinner party with the victim's mutual friends and parents to gloat. Almost all of the cuts, besides two that I remember, occur by zooming in on the back of a shirt and cutting when the black fills the screen, then pulling away.
The two leads are kind of annoying, one the stereotypical smug and confident brains of the operation and the other a paranoid, jittery accomplice. It is a decent film, the guests discussing the lateness of the victim amongst themselves as the murderers wink at each other, until Jimmy Stewart walks in (at around 30 minutes) and puts everyone to shame. Stewart slowly figures everything out and kept my full attention for the rest of the rather short (80 minutes) film.
Some really good sequences: Stewart questions the piano-playing accomplice as a metronome ticks, leading to an interrogation backed by stumbling, clumsy music. Everyone talks about the victim off-camera, except for Stewart's back and sleeve, while the image onscreen is the maid cleaning the chest holding the body. As Stewart explains his reasoning to the killers, night has fallen and a flashing neon sign turns on and lights up the room - creating its own tense metronome.
Good stuff.
The two leads are kind of annoying, one the stereotypical smug and confident brains of the operation and the other a paranoid, jittery accomplice. It is a decent film, the guests discussing the lateness of the victim amongst themselves as the murderers wink at each other, until Jimmy Stewart walks in (at around 30 minutes) and puts everyone to shame. Stewart slowly figures everything out and kept my full attention for the rest of the rather short (80 minutes) film.
Some really good sequences: Stewart questions the piano-playing accomplice as a metronome ticks, leading to an interrogation backed by stumbling, clumsy music. Everyone talks about the victim off-camera, except for Stewart's back and sleeve, while the image onscreen is the maid cleaning the chest holding the body. As Stewart explains his reasoning to the killers, night has fallen and a flashing neon sign turns on and lights up the room - creating its own tense metronome.
Good stuff.