Vertigo, indeed.
I watched the movie Vertigo the first time when I spent a day in Spalding's MFA in creative writing residency program. One of the day's scheduled activities was a viewing of Vertigo, followed by a discussion. I was a little apprehensive, because I associated Hitchcock with scary movies, and I cannot do scary movies. However, I love creepy, twisted, crazy movies (so long as they do not include any actual visible ghosts), and so I completely loved Vertigo.
I've been really wanting to watch it again lately. I've been thinking to myself every couple of days, "Wow, that Vertigo was such a good movie. And how about that unbelievable ending? I can't believe how it ends! I really want to watch that again."
Today, my sister and I happened to be in the neighborhood of Wild and Woolly Video. I had a gift card that my mom had given me, and I decided it was a most excellent opportunity to rent it.
Carmen and I came home tonight, and watched it. And when it ended, I discovered that I had a completely erroneous memory of how the movie ended. COMPLETELY.
For some reason, I had an absolute memory of it ending with a shot of John Ferguson back in the mental institution, with something about the way it is shot that lets the audience know that the entire last third of the movie, the entire part where he is losing his shit over Judy, was ALL IN HIS HEAD. For some reason, I had an absolute memory that that was what made the movie so truly crazy, that you think the mystery has been solved with this entirely un-supernatural explanation, and then all this craziness goes down, and in the end, it was all in his head, and how DID Madeline die, AFTER ALL?
As best I can reason is that this theory was proposed in the discussion that followed the viewing of the movie, and I must have really liked that theory, because my brain latched onto it and reinterpreted it as the way the movie actually played out.
Because I could have sworn that's how the movie ended. To the extent that I was running up to my computer yelling, "WHAT? WHAT?!!" before the ending credits were even over to see if there was some alternate ending that wasn't included on this version of the DVD. And, well, there was an alternate ending. But it in no way resembled my hallucinated ending.
It's so bizarre how something my mind has been thinking about regularly for the last couple of weeks was based on an entirely false memory.
I've been really wanting to watch it again lately. I've been thinking to myself every couple of days, "Wow, that Vertigo was such a good movie. And how about that unbelievable ending? I can't believe how it ends! I really want to watch that again."
Today, my sister and I happened to be in the neighborhood of Wild and Woolly Video. I had a gift card that my mom had given me, and I decided it was a most excellent opportunity to rent it.
Carmen and I came home tonight, and watched it. And when it ended, I discovered that I had a completely erroneous memory of how the movie ended. COMPLETELY.
For some reason, I had an absolute memory of it ending with a shot of John Ferguson back in the mental institution, with something about the way it is shot that lets the audience know that the entire last third of the movie, the entire part where he is losing his shit over Judy, was ALL IN HIS HEAD. For some reason, I had an absolute memory that that was what made the movie so truly crazy, that you think the mystery has been solved with this entirely un-supernatural explanation, and then all this craziness goes down, and in the end, it was all in his head, and how DID Madeline die, AFTER ALL?
As best I can reason is that this theory was proposed in the discussion that followed the viewing of the movie, and I must have really liked that theory, because my brain latched onto it and reinterpreted it as the way the movie actually played out.
Because I could have sworn that's how the movie ended. To the extent that I was running up to my computer yelling, "WHAT? WHAT?!!" before the ending credits were even over to see if there was some alternate ending that wasn't included on this version of the DVD. And, well, there was an alternate ending. But it in no way resembled my hallucinated ending.
It's so bizarre how something my mind has been thinking about regularly for the last couple of weeks was based on an entirely false memory.