So this filmmaker, Johan Grimonprez, who teaches at the School of Visual Arts in New York, gets the idea of creating a fictional film about Alfred Hitchcock constructed largely from footage of the man himself (e.g., the intros to his TV series) and based on an essay by Jorge Luis Borges, no less. The basic conceit? The Hitchcock of 1962 has a supernatural encounter with the older dying Hitchcock of the 1980s. And the filmmaker intercuts all this with footage of the early ’60s zeitgeist, the Cuban Missile Crisis, etc.
This is one of those films that can’t possibly live up to the promise of its premise. At least, that’s what A.O. Scott implies in his New York Times review. And yet the premise is such a clever one that even a halfway decent execution of it is bound to be at least … interesting. Anyway, here’s the trailer. If the reviews of Scott and others are to be trusted, we are not going to learn anything new and profound about Hitchcock or the 1960s, but we will be amused and entertained. One could do worse.
