In his essays and interviews, Alfred Hitchcock was guarded about substantive matters of morality, preferring instead to focus on discussions of technique. That has not, however, discouraged scholars and critics from trying to work out what his films imply about such moral matters as honesty, fidelity, jealousy, courage, love, and loyalty. Through discussions and analyses of such films as
Strangers on a Train,
Rear Window,
Vertigo,
North by Northwest, and
Frenzy, the contributors to this book strive to throw light on the way Hitchcock depicts a moral—if not amoral or immoral—world. Drawing on perspectives from film studies, philosophy, literature, and other disciplines, they offer new and compelling interpretations of the filmmaker’s moral gaze and the inflection point it provides for modern cinema.
Table des matières
Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
R. Barton Palmer and
Steven M. Sanders
Skepticism
1. Jealousy and Trust in
The Lodger
Graham Petrie
2. Fun with Suspicion
Thomas Leitch
3. Heroic Satans and Other Hitchcockian Heresies
Nick Haeffner
4. “Guilt, Confession, and . . . Then What?”:
The Paradine Case and
Under Capricorn
Brian Mc Farlane
5. The Forgotten Cigarette Lighter and Other Moral Accidents in
Strangers on a Train
George Toles
Immorality
6. Hitchcock’s Immoralists
Steven M. Sanders
7. Hitchcock the Amoralist:
Rear Window and the Pleasures and Dangers of Looking
Sidney Gottlieb
8. Voyeurism Revisited
Richard Allen
Moralizing
9. Alfred Hitchcock as Moralist
Murray Pomerance
10. The Deepening Moralism of
The Wrong Man
R. Barton Palmer
11. Hitchcock and the Philosophical End of Film
Jerold J. Abrams
Moral Acts
12. The Dread of Ascent: The Moral and Spiritual Topography of
Vertigo
Alan Woolfolk
13. The Philosophy of Marriage in
North by Northwest
Jennifer L. Jenkins
14. “The Loyalty of an Eel”: Issues of Political, Personal, and Professional Morality in (and around)
Torn Curtain
Neil Sinyard
15. Hobbes, Hume, and Hitchcock: The Case of
Frenzy
Homer B. Pettey
Bibliography
Alfred Hitchcock Selected Filmography
Contributors
Index
A propos de l’auteur
R. Barton Palmer is Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature at Clemson University. His previous books include
Invented Lives, Imagined Communities: The Biopic and American National Identity (coedited with William H. Epstein) and
Hitchcock at the Source: The Auteur as Adaptor (coedited with David Boyd), both also published by SUNY Press.
Homer B. Pettey is Professor of Film and Literature at the University of Arizona. His previous books include
Film Noir and
International Noir, both coedited with R. Barton Palmer.
Steven M. Sanders is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Bridgewater State University. He is the author or editor of many books, including
The Philosophy of Michael Mann (coedited with Aeon J. Skoble and R. Barton Palmer) and
The Philosophy of Steven Soderbergh (coedited with R. Barton Palmer).