Monday, December 03, 2007

Hitchcockery

Since I've posted quite a few adverts shot by Directors I like, heres another that just appeared online. But for whats basically an advertisement for Wine, this one has a tremendously classy pedigree. Directed by Martin Scorsese and shot by the great Harris Savides, "The Key to Reserva" is a fun tribute to Alfred Hitchcock in the style of Hitchcock. In a way, it feels like it really should have been directed by Brian DePalma, but Scorsese - whose only film in any way resembling this up to now was "Cape Fear" - does a fine job. The use of Bernard Herrmann's "North By Northwest" score is obviously crucial to maintaining the mood, but Scorsese and Savides uncannily emulate his distinctive visual style too. The lighting techniques are perfect, the velvet richness to the reds feels just right, and the shot choice is brilliant. It even uncovers a hitherto unnoticed certain old-fashioned square-jawed stiffness to Simon Baker. And Scorsese, interviewed by "Oceans 11" Screenwriter Ted Griffin, is always good at parodying himself onscreen:

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5 Comments:

Blogger Monsterwork said...

I was quite bowled over by the M&S adverts with Banderas in them.

5:52 pm  
Blogger David N said...

I couldn't quite believe he was in them, actually. It seems such a domestic chain to me, and hes a proper International Movie Star. Even if he is getting on a bit. Though M&S has quite a different profile abroad, I suppose. Its actually associated with British sophistication, somehow, rather than quite nice microwave meals and underwear.

Or maybe he just wanted to meet Noemie Lenoir. Or Myleene Klass. I can understand that motivation...

12:08 am  
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11:22 am  
Blogger Monsterwork said...

Blogroll?

I thank you too, friend.

Coming back to the clip. It's got one of those weird falling effects in it. Like when John Vernon takes a dive in Point Blank. That shits me up way more than any dummy thrown off a cliff or looking-up-at-a-stuntman-before-he-hits-a-crash-mat. It's that weird floaty look, and the actor has this pathetic expression on.

I don't know if De Palma would have been as faithful to colour and technique, you know. Those strange turns of the camera that are both jerky and smooth. He wouldn't have gone for the Lo-Fi. But there would have been a better-looking girl in it and more blood.

12:50 pm  
Blogger David N said...

Yeah, DePalma does Hitchcock by taking Hitchcockian subjects or Hitchcockian scenarios and filtering them through his own coldly sleazy sensibility. This is Scorsese doing it as he thinks Hitchcock would actually have done it, and I wonder if DePalma would be capable of this, subsuming his own directorial personality. I doubt it. Whereas Scorsese's pure love for all sorts of cinema is so ardent that I can imagine him being able to ape just about any director from the 30s to the 60s if the fim demanded it.

12:11 am  

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