Every summer, the historic Tennessee Theater offers Knoxvillians a chance to see a select few classic films on the big screen through their “Summer Movie Magic” series. Their selection generally consists of films whose reputation precedes them to such a degree that you may feel like you’ve seen them even if you haven’t: Gone With The Wind, Titanic, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and The Wizard of Oz, to name a few. The Hitchcock films they’ve shown in recent years have a similar sense of cultural osmosis. Even if you haven’t seen Psycho, for example, you know the screeching violins and the violent editing of the shower scene—and you probably have a pretty good idea of what that movie is like through its innumerable parodies and homages. But in the case of Vertigo, which opens this year’s “Summer Movie Magic” series this next weekend, any newcomers would be wise to leave all expectations at the door.
Vertigo is perhaps most famously known for inventing a camera technique called the “dolly zoom” (or colloquially, “the Vertigo effect”) in order to visually simulate the experience of acrophobia. Whenever the film’s protagonist, played by Jimmy Stewart, looks down a tall flight of stairs, we see what he feels:
This optical illusion of sorts is achieved either by pulling the camera backwards while zooming forward with the lens, or vice versa. The trick has been repurposed by countless films (notably Jaws, Poltergeist, and Goodfellas), but the effect is always the same: it warps our sense of perspective. Whatever objective reality you feel grounded by begins to stretch and give way beneath your feet–and this is the experience of watching Vertigo on a narrative level, as well.
Vertigo seems to be a simple detective story. Jimmy Stewart plays an out-of-work policeman who is commissioned by a friend to follow and study his wife (played by Kim Novak). She’s been acting inexplicably odd—he even suspects she could be possessed by a ghost—and he needs a new perspective to understand exactly what’s going on, as do we. You may have an idea of how this story will unfold, especially given the names involved: Jimmy Stewart is the American everyman from John Ford’s westerns and Frank Capra’s underdog stories, and Alfred Hitchcock is, of course, the “master of suspense.” But Vertigo is far from the story of a good man solving a mystery, nor does it quite become a pulse pounding thriller by the end. No, Vertigo is something much stranger, more akin to Persona or Mulholland Dr than Hitchcock’s other Hollywood pictures. The film takes a long, slow, and winding path into the uncanny. It is a vaguely disturbing (and even disgusting!) film, but it never disturbs in a generic way; it’s horror is a subtle warping of perspective, through which the mundane becomes sinister and the chivalrous becomes predatory.
Released in 1958, Vertigo celebrates its 60th anniversary this year, 5 years after dethroning Citizen Kane as the top-rated film of all time on the long-running Sight and Sound poll. But perhaps it is best to put the acclaim out of one’s mind—wondering “is this really the greatest film ever made?” is bound to color one’s perception of Vertigo, similar to expectations about which genre it operates in, or where its mystery will lead. Instead, one should simply enjoy Vertigo on its own terms: appreciate how a film this bizarre has somehow been elevated to GOAT-status by widespread consensus; let the narrative take you where it leads without reservation; soak in the lush use of Technicolor and Hitchcock’s camera trickery. But most importantly, savor the experience of getting to see a film as singular as Vertigo in a space as elegant as the Tennessee Theater.
Vertigo screens twice next weekend: once on Friday, June 15th at 8 PM and once on Sunday, June 17th at 2 PM. Each screening is $9 for adults and $7 for children (under 12) and senior citizens (over 65). And like all screenings at the historic Tennessee Theater, it will be preceded by a live Wurlitzer performance of songs hand-picked to complement the film being shown. The full list of films screening as part of the 2018 “Summer Movie Magic” series are listed below–but Vertigo gets our highest recommendation.
