When I first started taking old movies seriously (roughly my senior year of high school), it didn’t take long for me to realize that Alfred Hitchcock was my favorite of the Golden Age film directors. It is his best films that thrill me on every possible level like no other filmmaker.
Sadly, the new Universal releases (under the Legacy banner) do not do some of his best and most popular films any justice. Both Rear Window and Vertigo feature botched soundtracks with fake sound effects. Apparently, only the Stereo music element survives, and they had to dub in new sound effects. This wasn’t a problem with the old ‘Masterpiece’ editions, because they at least had the original mono, so you could hear everything as originally intended. Even though there is an option to choose between stereo and mono on the Legacy editions, they both have the fake sound effects. I don’t see any huge improvement in the picture quality from the last releases (I’ll leave that to DVDBeaver), but how many times can something be “fully restored” without people noticing it’s been “fully restored” about four times in the last ten years?
So keeping that in mind, two of these releases are gigantically flawed. Psycho, on the other hand, looks and sounds absolutely wonderful. Of the three, I’d recommend this one being the one you buy in the new edition. There are a few extras that sweeten the deal (like the actual Hitchcock/Truffaut interviews) , making it worth buying in addition to the Masterpiece package-monstrosity (it’s $50.99 as of today on Amazon). The sad part is is that the packaging for these movies is wonderful, but I think it’s a shame that the two were not given the proper treatment they most definitely deserve.
As for the films themselves, so much has been written about these things that it seems almost useless for me to attempt to state something that’s already been stated about a million times. Psycho still remains my favorite of the batch (North by Northwest being my favorite Hitchock and film period). Filmmakers of a lesser ilk can add all the gore, nudity, rape, and beastiality they want, they’ll never top this one in terms of a truly terrifying adult film.
Vertigo is masterpiece too, but how much of one, I’m not sure of. It has a few plot contrivances that keeps it from being Hitchcock’s most precious gem (though thankfully they did not use the ‘safe’ ending that was tacked on for foreign release, included here as a bonus feature), but even with them, it’s still Top 25 material.
Rear Window is a film I’ve never had a lot of time for, but that has more to do with my own taste than anything wrong with the film itself. Speaking from a technical standpoint, it’s probably at the top of Hitchock in terms of choreography. But its “too nice” ending and the presence of Thelma Ritter [shudder] just won’t allow me to warm up to it like so many other Hitchcockphiles do. I think the real problem for this film for me is that it all plays on the surface. It’s a fun film about James Stewart looking into other people’s lives, and only that. It doesn’t get deep enough to be a true masterpiece. Vertigo is also about Stewart looking into another’s life, but in addition, it’s not only a cross-examination of Madeline’s (Kim Novak) soul, but his own.
So what Universal has basically done is try to resell you the same movies in prettier wrapping. I don’t know if they are planning them for Blu-Ray (which I am expecting to tank any week now). Psycho is worth getting, if for some reason you don’t already own it. The other two are worth getting discounted, or asking your family, friends, or lovers for as a gift if you can’t think of anything else. Otherwise, you’ll have to live with the Masterpiece Collection (getting it at Amazon’s current price can’t be beat, even with the horrible packaging), and getting a batch of fairly bad movies (Torn Curtain, Topaz) in the process. Allow me to add that I think it’s nastily ironic that Universal is not only cashing in on movies it had nothing to do with, but also because Universal is the studio that ruined Hitchcock (who wanted to make more groundbreaking films, but had to cave into Universal’s insistence of making movies that adults could watch at the drive-in, right after the kids fell asleep after the Annette picture).
