Alfred Hitchcock: Sexual monster or Catholic moralist?

Finally, a debate about something having nothing to do with politics and politicians:

Was Alfred Hitchcock a sexual monster? Or was he, as the French film makers Rohmer and Chabrol once claimed, a moralist whose films are steeped in Roman Catholic themes?

Whatever his achievement as an artist, the personal reputation of Alfred Hitchcock remains the subject of heated dispute. Glance at biographies of the British director and two wildly differing Hitchcocks emerge. Donald Spoto's highly readable The Dark Side of Genius: the Life of Alfred Hitchcock portrays a frustrated lecher who delights in torturing his leading blondes. Yet in Patrick McGilligan's later, authoritative, 818-page Alfred Hitchcock: a Life in Darkness and Light, Hitchcock appears as an iconoclastic if ultimately devout Roman Catholic whose entire oeuvre is "suffused" with a profound Catholicism.

"His Catholicism is overt on a superficial and a profund level" McGilligan claims. "On a superficial level, he is irreverent: think, for example, of the false nun with high heels in The Lady Vanishes. On a profound level, the Catholicism is conscious. A constant theme in the Hitchcock film is the wrong person being caught by the police, and convicted. The police in his movies are often stupid, and Hitchcock was not prepared – with the exception of The Paradine Case (1947) - to let his victims go to court. Often they precipitate their own demise. Hitchcock was strongly opposed to capital punishment and his films question the infallibility of earthly justice as opposed to God's justice"

I Confess, Hitchcock's one explicitly Catholic film pivots on the question of the limits of earthly justice. Released in 1953, and sometimes dubbed the "forgotten" Hitchcock, it is the Quebec-set story of a young Catholic priest (played by the dashing Montgomery Clift) who hears a confession of murder in the confessional, and is later framed for the crime. Bound by the confessional seal, he cannot reveal the truth in court.

"This is the most Catholic of Hitchcock's films" says the film critic Father Peter Malone MSC, who deals with Hitchcock's Catholicism in his book Through a Catholic Lens: Religious Perspectives of 19 Film Directors from Around the World. "But there is a lot of Catholicism explicitly and with images in The Wrong Man (1956). Everybody notes Hitchcock’s strong sense of sin and guilt (and some kind of expiation) which also influenced the films of Claude Chabrol considerably. This may be due to his Jesuit education and their strong use of casuistic moral theology (case studies and focus on individual situations as well as general principles). I am wary of all the talk about "Catholic guilt" these days but if someone did seem to have this sense (but with forgiveness) it is Hitchcock."

Read the entire article at Times Online.

It's been far too many years since I've watched any Hitchcock movies. And if I recall correctly, I've only watched one— I Confess—since I became Catholic in 1997. Even if it were the case that Hitchcock was some sort of lecherous creep (and it sounds as though he really wasn't), it wouldn't be a surprise that Catholic imagery and morality would suffuse his work. That is, after all, rather common in the work of filmmakers, painters, musicians, and authors from Catholic backgrounds, who rarely, if ever, fully escape (and many do try to escape) the power, beauty, and mystery of Catholicism.

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Comments

[Paul H]

Hi Carl,

I don't really have much to say about the themes in Hitchcock's films, but since you say it has been quite a while since you have seen any of his movies, I would recommend that you watch a few of his movies when you have a chance. There are a few that I don't like (including Psycho, which seems to be just about everyone's favorite), but many of them are excellent. Off the top of my head, I would recommend The Lady Vanishes, Strangers on a Train, Vertigo, Torn Curtain, Rope, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Rear Window, and North by Northwest. I'm not a movie buff at all, but I love Hitchcock. I have to admit though that I have never seen I Confess. I need to make a point to watch that one soon.

[Carl E. Olson]

Paul: I've seen Vertigo, Rear Window, and North by Northwest, and perhaps The Man Who Knew Too Much. I should look look for a "Best of Hitchcock" compilation to buy; there aren't too many current movies that interest me.

[Paul H]

> "there aren't too many current movies that interest me."

My sentiment exactly! :-) There are maybe one or two new movies per year, on average, that I have any interest at all in seeing. This year it was "Expelled" (which I missed), and "Veggie Tales - The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything" (which I also missed), and just maybe "Star Wars: Clone Wars" -- maybe.

> "I should look look for a 'Best of Hitchcock' compilation to buy"

Compilations of his later movies (post-1940) unfortunately are rather expensive. I videotaped several of his movies from AMC, when they showed quite a few of his movies commercial-free some years ago. I don't know if they still do that or not -- I haven't watched AMC in years.

But you can find several collections of his earlier movies (pre-1940) for very reasonable prices -- because these movies are old enough to be in the public domain. (The only problem is that many of his best movies came later, at least in my opinion.)

For example, I have this collection:

Alfred Hitchcock - The Legend Begins (20 Movie Classics)

I've only watched three or four of the movies on here, but with 20 movies for less than $10, I still have gotten my money's worth. It has The Lady Vanishes and The 39 Steps, which are both very good. I just need to find the time to watch the other 16 or 17 movies in this set that I haven't watched yet. :-)

[Gabriel McAuliffe]

Another one that you left out is the Trouble with Harry, which is terribly funny.

I don't know how much the Catholic faith informed Hitchcock's films but he certainly was willing to tug at societal morality (risque), so much so that my cousin was a bit bothered as she recently watched North by Northwest with her son. I should have realized some of the naughty things that go on in that picture, even though implied.

However, as for the personal life of Alfred Hitchcock, his daughter Patricia married Joseph O'Connell, nephew of William O'Connell, first archbishop of Boston to become Cardinal. That may have kept him in the loop in regards to the faith.