Monday, December 10, 2012

Frenzy about Hitchcock

So, they have made “Hitchcock”, with that nice Welshman, Anthony Hopkins. Premiered yesterday. We have several Hitchcock films on line, with many identified locations, but did you know that the great man has a blue plaque on a house in London’s Cromwell Road where he lived for a dozen or so years before WW11, and it wasn’t as posh in those years. He, Hitch, worked at the Gainsborough Studios in Islington, whose logo was a pretty girl in a large feathered hat. Islington certainly wasn’t posh either. But then our hero always had a taste for the dark side of life, as well as for girls, Gainsborough or otherwise. The BBC / HBO recent film, The Girl, is about this darker side and would appear to suggest that the late great director, could, or should, be investigated, along with Jim Saville and a few others. However here in ReelStreets we are only concerned with the bits and pieces of architectural detail that were included in Hitchcock’s films, and Frenzy with an incredibly long shot coming out of THE house, and backing, it seemed forever, across Covent Garden, will always be remembered as a first, and an example of this man’s creative genius. The “Mr Hyde” side of his character must be left to those who believe they knew him.