352. Vertigo (1958)

Starring: James Stewart, Kim Novak, Barbara Bel Geddes

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Running Time: 128 mins

Vertigo is an American film about a man, suffering from a fear of heights, who is called upon by an old friend to investigate his wife’s strange activities, however in doing so, the man develops a dangerous obsession for her.

This movie was pretty striking. It was visually brilliant to watch, with a clever storyline, with, as usual, quite a few unexpected twists along the way.

In comparison to what you would expect from a Hitchcock film, this was very different. Rather than being a thrilling, mind-bending tale of deceit and crime, it appeared to me to be a much artsier and more fantastical story, an atmosphere greatly emphasised by the bizarre nature of the romance between the two main characters.

These qualities may not have been a bad thing, however I felt that the focus on the romance took away some more exciting elements of what initially seemed like a very promising story, nonetheless by the end of the film, it did become much livelier, and therefore more interesting to watch.

The beginning of this film was also a little difficult to watch. As the story was building tension, I struggled to really get into the story and be truly interested in what the ultimate outcome would be, therefore boring me a little bit, which was a little disappointing to see.

But overall, you can’t discredit the fact that the story of this film is extremely clever, and it is a very impressionable that will stay with you for quite some time, so I’ll give it an 8.1.