Alfred Hitchcock is one of the most iconic directors in cinematic history. Dubbed “The Master of Suspense,” his career spanned from pioneering the medium with silent films in the 1920s to Cold War-era thrillers in the 1960s. He is credited with directing over fifty films.
While Hitchcock’s catalog of movies may be too vast for anyone besides the most ardent cinephile to explore in full, most anyone could rattle off a few of his well-known works. Perhaps you’re still haunted by the classic shower scene from “Psycho” where Janet Leigh becomes prey for a knife-wielding maniac. Maybe low flying planes cause you to panic as you recall Cary Grant getting dive-bombed by a malicious crop duster in “North by Northwest.” Or perchance you glance twice at flocks of crows in remembrance of Tippi Hedren’s nightmarish experiences in “The Birds.”
Hitchcock was not just known for his suspenseful stories, but even more so, how he told those tales. He was a visual storyteller who relished tantalizing his audience with the images on the screen rather than dialogue. Though Hitchcock died in 1980, other directors and moviemakers have long been emulating his style, borrowing his techniques and stories and even remaking his films. For instance, “Psycho” was remade with the likes of Vince Vaughn and Julianne Moore in 1998 by director Gus Van Sant. More so than straight remakes though, movies inspired by Hitchcock are much more plentiful.
A new offering to that category is the Netflix film “The Woman in the Window.” The movie follows Amy Adams as a shut-in in her giant Manhattan brownstone who has plenty of time to watch the new neighbors. When she swears she sees a violent act, her already fragile state-of-mind starts to unravel further and the audience is left not knowing what to believe. Bridget and Rob dig into this thriller with their reviews and offer up some other worthwhile Hitchcock-inspired films.
Before we get to the main topic, what’s your favorite Hitchcock film and why?
Rob: I’d love to give a contrarian answer and recommend some little known hidden gem, but for my money, “Vertigo” is Hitch’s masterpiece. It’s Jimmy Stewart’s best performance, late ‘50s San Francisco looks impeccable, and it covers his core themes of identity, obsession, attraction and sexuality like nothing else he made. “North by Northwest” is right behind it, and “Strangers on a Train,” which features the most intense tennis scene in film history, is my wild card.
Bridget: It’s not viewed as one of his best, but for me, I still most remember and enjoy “The Birds.” It probably comes from the fact that I watched this one at the youngest age and hence there’s nostalgia there. As I’ve said before, my mom wouldn’t let us watch many rated R movies as kids. “The Birds” was only rated PG-13 though and a-ok! It’s psychological terror probably outweighs the bad language and violence of an actual R-rated film. I was so intrigued by what seems like a pretty banal enemy- a flock of birds- causing so much havoc. Hitchcock does not give a reason why the birds are attacking and doesn’t need to. The look in the eyes of Tippi Hedren and Jessica Lange as they’re repeatedly attacked speaks horrifying volumes and I love it.
Anyway, now we can get back to the task at hand.
Bridget: “The Woman in the Window” has a bit of a troubled backstory. The film is based on a book by A.J. Finn. The movie rights were picked up by Fox 2000 before the book even came out. Finn was subsequently accused of lying about various aspects of his life and all but plagiarizing the book from a few different sources. That combined with the fact that Fox was eaten by Disney and then COVID making a theatrical release difficult, the movie found its way to Netflix with much less pomp and circumstance than it was predicted to have. Rob, fill us in on what the movie is about.
Rob: Well, there’s a woman named Anna (played by Amy Adams), and she looks out her window a lot. Her life is falling apart, her marriage is collapsing (or is it?) and pretty much everyone in her life thinks she’s crazy. She’s a therapist who sees a therapist (Tracy Letts, who also wrote the script), and she passes the time between paranoid fever dreams watching classic noir films and drinking wine. When a family moves into the apartment across the street, she’s immediately suspicious of the controlling patriarch, his loudmouth wife and their “sensitive” son. As you might guess, nothing is quite as it seems. Bridget, where does it go from there?
Bridget: Anna begins to watch her neighbors’ every move, often through the lens of a camera, a la Jimmy Stewart in Hitchcock’s “Rear Window.” And no surprise, just like in the film this one is ripping off, Anna sees something shocking happen to one of the neighbors. At this point, her fragile consciousness begins to unravel as she seeks to convince not only those around her, but also herself, that what she saw actually happened. The end of the movie tries to fit in more twists and turns than the staircases in Anna’s ridiculously large house. Rob, at the end of the day, did this movie work for you?
Rob: I hate to start our reviews in this column on an 0-for-2 streak, but as its title might suggest, “The Woman in the Window” ultimately feels like a copy of a copy of a copy. It’s a waste of a whale of a cast that includes Adams, Gary Oldman, Julianne Moore, Anthony Mackie, Brian Tyree Henry and Jennifer Jason Leigh. One of the hallmarks of Hitchcock’s style is an innate playfulness and flirtation between the lead characters, even if they’re caught in difficult and/or murderous situations, and Letts and Wright’s update is one of the most humorless movies I’ve ever seen. It’s misery all the way down, from the opening frame to the hamfisted violent conclusion, and Amy Adams seems to be afflicted with Glenn Close Syndrome– after all, they did star together in “Hillbilly Elegy.” If looking as haggard as possible and playing nothing but self-pitying charisma vacuums is the only way she thinks she’ll get an Oscar, then just hand her one right now and let her go back to having fun again. Somebody get David O. Russell on the phone. Bridget, where are you at on this one?
Bridget: I have to say that I didn’t really love it either. The dourness didn’t bother me as much as what seemed like cheap attempts to emulate Hitchcock. Gary Oldman’s menacing neighbor character even looks like a clone of Raymond Burr, Jimmy Stewart’s murdering neighbor in “Rear Window.” By about the third or fourth twist at the end of the movie, I was done with it. It just got too over-the-top and silly for me. I felt like I was watching a mediocre Lifetime movie by the end. In my experience, I’ve enjoyed Joe Wright as a director. I know he’s had a few big flops – “Pan” (2015) and “Hanna” (2011), but he’s also had some big wins. His 2005 version of “Pride and Prejudice” starring Keira Knightley is one of my favorite movies and “Atonement” (2007) was nominated for a boat-load of awards. This movie though seems like another bad turn for him. The contrived source material became too much to overcome.
Rob: If there’s a silver lining to any of it, though, the movie does appear to be doing well on Netflix. It’s been in the number one or number two spot pretty steadily for the last week, and many of the platform’s big awards contenders aren’t nearly as popular. Whether or not the critics love them, there’s still a market for adaptations of sleazy beach read murder mystery novels, so we’ll probably get plenty more in the months and years ahead. Bridget, to switch gears a bit, what are some of your favorite Hitchcock remakes, re-imaginings or straight-up ripoffs?
Bridget: Ironically, my top one is another “Rear Window” re-imagining, 2007’s “Disturbia.” This film stars Shia LaBeouf (before he got really weird) and sets up the story in suburbia built around bored teenagers whiling away their summer spying on a neighbor played by the smooth-talking David Morse. It’s pretty similar to most “Rear Window” rip-offs, but I think this one really succeeds. It’s funny, engaging, titillating, and darn creepy when it needs to be. It might read more as a teen thriller, but I find it very re-watchable. Another one I came across recently is “Buried” (2010), starring Ryan Reynolds. There are some strong tie-ins to the Hitchcock movie “Rope.” Though I haven’t seen “Rope,” I strongly recommend “Buried,” that is if you can tolerate hanging out in a coffin with the buried alive Reynolds for about 90 minutes. Rob, what are your favorites when it comes to Hitchcock-inspired films?
Rob: Well, my personal favorite is a little older, but it also ties back to “Rear Window.” It’s none other than the 1989 Joe Dante cult classic “The Burbs,” starring the legendary Tom Hanks at a relatively young age along with Bruce Dern as a stern Vietnam veteran, Carrie Fisher as Hanks’s wife and Corey Feldman as their quirky teenage kid down the street. The plot set-up is more or less the same: Hanks and Fisher move to a new home and begin to suspect that their neighbors might be doing some heinous ritualistic murders. The big difference is that “The Burbs” is hilarious, and Dante is one of the most underrated comedy directors of all time. I would feel sacrilegious if I didn’t at least mention Brian De Palma, who made an entire career out of paying direct homage to Hitchcock in movies like “Obsession,” “Dressed to Kill,” “Body Double,” and “Sisters.” Any of the films mentioned above would be a big improvement over “The Woman in the Window.” Any final thoughts, Bridget?
Bridget: While we didn’t enjoy this movie, I think it’s fun to see filmmakers still paying homage to Hitchcock. I look forward to future offerings in that realm and hope we get a good one soon!
Look out for a special Memorial Day edition of Mid-America at the Movies next week, and as always, whether you’re loving or hating the column (or you’re somewhere in between), send your feedback to news@wrightcountymonitor.com or publisher@grundyregister.com. Happy watching!
