VERTIGO-1958-3 1/2 STARS

27. January 2008 by Ria.

This movie stars the suave detective John Ferguson (James Stuart), nicknamed Scottie. Now Scottie has acrophobia (fear of heights) as a result of watching a fellow police officer fall to his death, while making a desperate attempt to save him. This extreme case of acrophobia causes dizziness, or in other words, vertigo. Scottie retires from police work and spends a lot of his time hanging out at his friend Midge’s (Barbara Bel Geddes) home.

As a result of extreme boredom (I suppose), he lets Midge know that he’s still “available” but she doesn’t take him up on his offer. She’s going to regret that decision because in comes woman #2, Crazy Madeline (Kim Novak). Madeline’s husband Gavin (Tom Helmore) hires Scottie to follow her because she’s turning into a space Cadette, and he’s afraid that she might try to commit suicide. Madeline is obsessed with a woman named Carlotta Valdes who killed herself over a hundred years ago.

Madeline is really strange, she loves hanging around Carlotta’s grave and seems to possess the personality of an end table, but hey, she’s good looking, so who cares, she has Scottie’s complete attention. Yes, I know he was paid to follow her, but trust me, he enjoyed every minute of it. Next, she travels to the Golden Gate Bridge, and jumps into the San Francisco Bay, where Scottie directly follows in an attempt to rescue her.

See, this is another time where looks come into play. If it was a woman with average to below average looks who jumped into the Bay, Scottie would have thrown her a stick, or what do you call those things, the balloon with a hole in it, life preservers? Yeah, that’s it, he would have thrown her a life preserver, and said, “Hold on, let me go get someone to help fish you out!”

Okay, so Madeline and Scottie fall in love and kiss, sorry Midge, you had your chance. Maybe you should go visit the nearest spa and get a face lift or something, I don’t know. Anyway, back to the love birds, Scottie takes Crazy Madeline to San Juan Bautista, so that she can overcome her nightmares, but she decides to turn into a full blown emo by running into the bell tower, climbing the stairs, and jumping to her death. Poor Scottie, He tried to save her, but remember, he has vertigo, and couldn’t quite make it all the way up the stairs, now he’s devastated and is placed in a mental hospital.

Over a woman that he only knew for a couple of days? Wow. Maybe I should visit a spa and get a facial overhaul or something. Eventually Scottie snaps out of it, sort of. Well, he’s walking the streets again, but he’s going to the places he and Madeline used to hang out at, not a good idea. He finally spots Judy, a woman who has Madeline’s features, but she’s a brunette (in contrast to Madeline who was platinum blonde), but that’s okay, because he has plans to give her a major image overhaul, and follows her to her apartment. 

Judy, with her tough inner city chick mannerisms (in contrast to Madeline’s suburban la-de-da-ness), tells Scottie to buzz off, until he tells her that he’ll take care of her. Uh oh, I’m sure she saw imaginary dollar signs floating in front of her eyes after hearing that! She was probably saying to herself, “Wow, that means I can get him to pay my rent, my phone bill, all my charge cards, then I can finally quit my job at the department store” which she eventually does, I’m assuming, so that she can hang out with Scottie all day and night.

No, I’m just joking around, Judy really does has feelings for him, but she’s harboring a secret. She is Madeline, well the Madeline that Scottie fell in love with, because the real Madeline is dead. Remember Gavin? If not, then you need to go back and read paragraph one, keep up with me, okay? He is the guy that hired Scottie to follow Madeline, his wife, who is also very rich.

Well, you know how some marriages go, he got tired of her, and instead of throwing her out on her butt, and going through a messy divorce, he decided, “Why bother with all that hassle when I can just kill her, and keep all the money”,so he starts thinking of a plan to murder her, and cover his tracks. So he hires Judy (who was also his mistress at the time) and made her over so that she could look like Madeline who was stashed somewhere out of the way until the day she was pushed from the bell tower. 

The plan was brilliant because Madeline never came to town much, so Judy was able to take over the role with ease. Scottie was bought in the mix to corroborate the fact that Madeline jumped, given her earlier suicidal behavior as he followed her around, and remember, because of his vertigo, he wasn’t able to climb to the top of the stairs, to find out that the real Madeline was pushed by her husband, to her death, who afterwards dumped Judy, and then probably ran off to the Bermuda to enjoy his new life.

I could go on, but this is supposed to a review, not a book, but I will tell you that eventually Scottie finds all this out, because Judy keeps a necklace that she was wearing while portraying Madeline. Confused? I think you should just watch the movie, and you will also find out that Judy loses her life at that same tower. Did Scottie push her? Maybe, maybe not. Alfred Hitchcock is awesome, isn’t he?

Click on this link and watch Scottie check out Judy in character as Madeline!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTm17npIYzo

Now, click on this link to see Scottie follow Madeline!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DMvyVnSfI0

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