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Alfred Hitchcock

A Hank of Hair and a Piece of Bone

Dead or alive?

By Alan Vanneman

See the introduction to this nine-part photo study.

Alfred Hitchcock was fascinated by inanimate objects that suggested life. His interiors are invariably filled with paintings and sculptures, lifelike objects that, to Hitchcock, implied death rather than life.

In his early film The Lady Vanishes, the hero and heroine, Michael Redgrave and Margaret Lockwood, look in the baggage car for clues to discover what happened to Miss Froy (Dame May Whitty) and stumble across a cut-out of "Signor Doppo" (Philip Leaver).

Notice how Redgrave's pose mirrors the cut-out.

In Hitchcock's 1956 remake of The Man Who Knew Too Much, there's an odd scene where Jimmy Stewart wanders into a taxidermy shop, encountering, among other things, a stuffed tiger. This sequence, of course, looks forward to the stuffed birds of Psycho.

Although dozens of paintings appear in Hitchcock's films, Psycho in particular, few have much impact. One that does occurs in Strangers on a Train, when the fluttery Mrs. Antony (Marion Lorne) reveals her latest creation to her son Bruno (Robert Walker). The canvas, a portrait of St. Francis, suggests that all is not well among the Antonys.

Hitchcock's menagerie threatens to overflow in Psycho. There are, first of all, Norman's birds. (Note the clock as well, which is almost impossible to see in the film.)

Like the tiger in The Man Who Knew Too Much, Norman's birds seem ready to attack.

In addition to the birds, there is a Cupid that guards the door at the right of the foot of the stairs, a door that is never opened.

Endless surprises await in Mrs. Bates' room — an ecstatic statue, her carefully maintained clothes, her crossed hands, and her bed, deformed by her unchanging position.

Although Hitchcock used mirrors endlessly in his work, they are rarely used for overt drama. However, he achieves a phenomenal effect in Psycho when Lila Crane (Vera Miles) sees a double reflection of herself in two mirrors. Notice how the gaze of the "second Lila" (the far-right image) takes us deep into the center of the frame, where the gaze of the "third Lila" directs us back out of the frame toward the "first Lila" at the far left, who is turning around to confront who? Us? Someone behind us? Mrs. Bates?

Lila Crane does not scare easily. She soldiers on to investigate Norman's room. His battered toys and filthy bed exemplify his soiled childishness.

Lila pursues her search to the bitter end, discovering the embalmed corpse of Mrs. Bates in the basement. The swinging overhead light, casting patterns of light and shadow on the skull, suggests movement and life in a dead thing — death reaching out to claim the living.

This horrific image was anticipated in Strangers on a Train when the hero, Guy Haines (Farley Granger), is trapped aboard a runaway merry-go-round. Bruno (Robert Walker) struggles to force Guy's head beneath the rising and plunging hoof of one of the horses. Hitchcock shows us the horse's rising and falling head as a symbol of the power of death.

Another image that haunted Hitchcock is the "faceless face," a backlit face with the features obscured. Psycho is so aggressively noir that virtually every character appears backlit, though the real payoff, of course, occurs during the shower scene. However, Hitchcock had used the effect before, in Rear Window, for example, where an irritated Raymond Burr seeks to settle things with Jimmy Stewart.

Hitchcock used a similar effect at the conclusion of Vertigo, with the mysterious nun seemingly materializing out of the darkness.

But it's the shower scene that combines these techniques in an unforgettable manner.

Hitchcock returned to the image in Marnie. Here we see Marnie's unpleasant mother (Louise Latham) paying an unwanted nocturnal visit.

Click any of the links below for additional categories/motifs, or to return to the intro page:

Houses † Staircases † Women's Hair † Hands † Eyes

The Uncanny † The Vortex † Notorious Sequence

The Man Who Knew Too Much Sequence

ALSO: Check out other fine articles and reviews by the author.