The Philosophical Hitchcock : ’Vertigo’ and the Anxieties of Unknowingness

143 Pages·2017·3.08 MB·English

by  Pippin

The Philosophical Hitchcock
The Philosophical Hitchcock
Vertigo and the Anxieties of Unknowingness
Robert B. Pippin
The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London © 2017 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without
written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. For more
information, contact the University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637.
Published 2017
Printed in the United States of America
26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 1 2 3 4 5
ISBN-13: 978-0-22650364-6 (cloth)
ISBN-13: 978-0-22650378-3 (e-book)
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226503783.001.0001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Pippin, Robert B., 1948– author.
Title: The philosophical Hitchcock : Vertigo and the anxieties of unknowingness / Robert B. Pippin.
Description: Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2017. | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017001242 | ISBN 9780226503646 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780226503783 (e-
book) Subjects: LCSH: Vertigo (Motion picture : 1958) | Philosophy in motion pictures.
Classification: LCC PN1995.9.P42 P56 2017 | DDC 791.43/72—dc23 LC record available at
https://lccn.loc.gov/2017001242
This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).
In memory of Victor Perkins
You sort of forget you’re you.
—Emmy, Shadow of a Doubt
It’s quite remarkable to discover that one isn’t what one thought one was.
—Dr. Peterson, Spellbound
Who comes to seek the living among the dead?
—Luke 24:5
Contents
Acknowledgments
Prologue: Film and Philosophy
Introduction: The Issue
1. The Opening Credits
2. The Opening Chase
3. Introducing Midge
4. Gavin Elster and the Scheme
5. Ernie’s
6. Pop Leibel
7. In the Bay and in Scottie’s Apartment
8. Two Are Going Somewhere
9. Semper virens
10. Midge and Carlotta
11. The “Suicide”
12. The Coroner’s Inquest
13. Scottie’s Dream
14. Music Therapy
15. Finding Judy
16. The Transformation
17. The Revelation
18. “I Loved You So, Madeleine”
Concluding Remarks: Moral Suspension
Footnotes
Index
Plates
Acknowledgments
I began writing this book while teaching a summer seminar in Switzerland with
my friend and colleague Jim Conant, and I finished it sometime after we had
taught a course together at the University of Chicago on Hitchcock’s American
films. I want to express my thanks to Professor Katia Saporiti of the University
of Zurich for the invitation to deliver the seminar, and to the participants in the
seminar for our lively discussions. I am yet again, as with my other two books
about film, very grateful to Jim for our conversations about Hitchcock, film
aesthetics, and much else over the last twenty years.
I have also had the privilege of presenting material from this book in lectures
at Beloit College, Johns Hopkins, the University of Chicago, Northwestern,
Berkeley, and Stanford. The discussions after the lectures were invariably lively,
thoughtful, and very helpful, and I thank those audiences. I have also been
helped by generous comments from Dan Morgan, Wendy Doniger, Mark
Jenkins, Paul Kottman, and the late Victor Perkins, and by a number of acute
comments from Fred Rush.
I wrote the final draft over part of the summer at a farmhouse in the Hudson
River Valley. I am happy to express how very much I have gained from frequent
conversations there about the film and related matters with Michael Fried and
Ruth Leys, and how grateful I am for their valuable comments and for their
friendship.
This book is dedicated to the memory of Victor Perkins, who died in July of
2016. I had been a dedicated admirer of Victor’s work on film since I first read
Film as Film many years ago, and I then read everything else he wrote. I got to
know him personally about a decade ago in Chicago, and we stayed in touch
after that through correspondence and occasional meetings, in Warwick and then
for the last time in Munich. We shared a love for Nicholas Ray, Max Ophüls,
and Hitchcock, among others, and he was always as generous and insightful a
correspondent about drafts of articles and general issues as anyone I have ever
known. He was also among the most humane, kind, and forthright people I have
ever met. To say of someone that he was a “lovely person” can sound quite
indeterminate, but anyone who had the great good fortune to have known Victor
will know exactly what I mean.
White Oak House
Buskirk, New York
Buskirk, New York
July 2016