"The work discusses 12 Hitchcock films and reads them as raising and putting forth a position on three problem areas of epistemology: deception, knowledge of mind, and problematic knowledge of the external world. Introductions to these philosophical concepts are given, as well as summaries to the films analyzed"--Provided by publisher.
On the surface, The Philosophical Hitchcock: Vertigo and the Anxieties of Unknowingness, is a close reading of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 masterpiece Vertigo. This, however, is a book by Robert B. Pippin, one of our most penetrating and creative philosophers, and so it is also much more. Even as he provides detailed readings of each scene in the film, and its story of obsession and fantasy, Pippin reflects more broadly on the modern world depicted in Hitchcock’s films. Hitchcock’s characters, Pippin shows us, repeatedly face problems and dangers rooted in our general failure to understand others—or even ourselves—very well, or to make effective use of what little we do understand. Vertigo, with its impersonations, deceptions, and fantasies, embodies a general, common struggle for mutual understanding in the late modern social world of ever more complex dependencies. By treating this problem through a filmed fictional narrative, rather than discursively, Pippin argues, Hitchcock is able to help us see the systematic and deep mutual misunderstanding and self-deceit that we are subject to when we try to establish the knowledge necessary for love, trust, and commitment, and what it might be to live in such a state of unknowingness. A bold, brilliant exploration of one of the most admired works of cinema, The Philosophical Hitchcock will lead philosophers and cinephiles alike to a new appreciation of Vertigo and its meanings.
The shower scene in Psycho; Cary Grant running for his life through a cornfield; “innocent” birds lined up on a fence waiting, watching — these seminal cinematic moments are as real to moviegoers as their own lives. But what makes them so? What deeper forces are at work in Hitchcock’s films that so captivate his fans? This collection of articles in the series that’s explored such pop-culture phenomena as Seinfeld and The Simpsons examines those forces with fresh eyes. These essays demonstrate a fascinating range of topics: Sabotage’s lessons about the morality of terrorism and counter-terrorism; Rope’s debatable Nietzschean underpinnings; Strangers on a Train’s definition of morality. Some of the essays look at more overarching questions, such as why Hitchcock relies so heavily on the Freudian unconscious. In all, the book features 18 philosophers paying a special homage to the legendary auteur in a way that’s accessible even to casual fans.
The films of Alfred Hitchcock deal heavily with psychological and philosophical themes, and one needn't look very far into the canon to find them. In Psycho, for example, the personality metamorphosis in Marion Crane that leads her into grand larceny is a pale double of the murderous oedipal divide in Norman Bates. In The Birds, overbearing natural mutations turn what might have been a "creature feature" into a film about fear of the unknowable. This book looks at 12 Hitchcock films and the positions they put forth on three problem areas of epistemology: deception, knowledge of mind, and problematic knowledge of the external world. These philosophical concepts are explained and woven into the author's thorough and thought-provoking discussion of each film. Descartes and Wittengenstein star; Plato, Locke, Hume, Kant and Kierkegaard also make appearances in this new "philosopher's cut" of the master's works.
Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Science contains sixteen original essays by leading authors in the philosophy of science, each one defending the affirmative or negative answer to one of eight specific questions, including: Are there laws of social science? Are causes physically connected to their effects? Is the mind a system of modules shaped by natural selection? Brings together fresh debates on eight of the most controversial issues in the philosophy of science. Questions addressed include: “Are there laws of social science?”; “Are causes physically connected to their effects?”; “Is the mind a system of modules shaped by natural selection?” Each question is treated by a pair of opposing essays written by eminent scholars, and especially commissioned for the volume. Lively debate format sharply defines the issues, and paves the way for further discussion. Will serve as an accessible introduction to the major topics in contemporary philosophy of science, whilst also capturing the imagination of professional philosophers.
This book reads Alfred Hitchcock as a philosopher of what constitutes the erotic. The author argues that Hitchcock is doing a post-Nietzschean, postmodern kind of philosophy in which he is exploring and creating possibilities of what the erotic can feel like and how the erotic can be expressed. The erotic is a pervasive phenomenon in Hitchcock’s films. It involves irony, play, and sophistication, and there can be erotic failures as well as erotic successes. The erotic is most complexly explored by Hitchcock in his two masterpieces from the 1950s: Vertigo (1958), a story of the failure of the erotic, and North by Northwest (1959), in which the erotic is consummated in marriage. The author argues that Hitchcock has a philosophical theory about what makes the difference. It is a version of existential philosophy that understands what a person is to be based on what they make of themselves through their choices. The author argues that the erotic for Hitchcock is a process of mutual, reciprocal creation of the personality of the other person. This process is complicated by the fact that as one attempts to create the person one desires, one is simultaneously being created by that other person, and so what one desires is also in a process of being recreated in the mutual reciprocal dance of the erotic entanglement. There is a moral dimension to this because erotic failure is, in a way, a failure of the human, not in the sense of a human essence, but in the sense of realizing human possibilities that can make our lives more satisfying, complete, and full. Hitchcock as Philosopher of the Erotic will appeal to scholars and advanced students working on philosophy of film, film studies, and philosophy of love and sex.
Reassesses the different visions of filmmakers Alfred Hitchcock, Orson Welles, and Jean Renoir, drawing on their writings and movies to reveal how they became sophisticated theorists on film and its place in the human experience.
Alfred Hitchcock's career spanned more than five decades, during which he directed more than 50 films, many of them indisputable classics: Notorious, Strangers on a Train, Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest, and Psycho, among others. In A Year of Hitchcock: 52 Weeks with the Master of Suspense, authors Jim McDevitt and Eric San Juan provide a comprehensive examination of Hitchcock's film-to-film development, spanning from the beginning of his career in silents to his final film in 1976, including his work on two French propaganda shorts he directed during World War II and segments he directed for Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Organized into 52 chapters and arranged in chronological order, the book invites readers to spend a year with the director's most notable works, all of which are available on DVD. Each film is examined in the context of Hitchcock's career, as the authors consider the themes central to his work; discuss each film's production; comment on the cast, script, and other aspects of the film; and assess the film's value to the Hitchcock viewer. From The Lodger to Family Plot, 68 works directed by Hitchcock are analyzed. Each analysis is supplemented by key film facts, trivia, awards, a guide to his cameos, a filmography, and a listing of available DVD releases. Whether readers decide to undertake the journey through his films one week at a time or pick and choose at their discretion, A Year of Hitchcock will open the eyes of any viewer who wants to better understand this director's evolution as an artist.
Film scholar Murray Pomerance presents a series of meditations on six films directed by the legendary Alfred Hitchcock, a master of the cinema. Two of the films are extraordinarily famous and have been seen - and misunderstood - countless times: North by Northwest and Vertigo. Two others, Marnie and Torn Curtain, have been mostly disregarded by viewers and critics, or considered to be colossal mistakes, while two others, Spellbound and I Confess have received almost no critical attention at all. Hitchcock's vision and his screen architecture, revealing key elements and showing how Hitchcock was profoundly interested not only in social class, but also in humanity's philosophical predicament, as we traverse a world fraught with shifting appearances, multiple deceptions, vulnerability and peril. Pomerance also reveals the link between Hitchcock's work and a wide range of thinkers and artists in other fields.
In a now-famous interview with Fran�ois Truffaut in 1962, Alfred Hitchcock described his masterpiece Rear Window (1954) as "the purest expression of a cinematic idea." But what, precisely, did Hitchcock mean by pure cinema? Was pure cinema a function of mise en sc�ne, or composition within the frame? Was it a function of montage, "of pieces of film assembled"? This notion of pure cinema has intrigued and perplexed critics, theorists, and filmmakers alike in the decades following this discussion. And even across his 40-year career, Hitchcock's own ideas about pure cinema remained mired in a lack of detail, clarity, and analytical precision. The Art of Pure Cinema is the first book-length study to examine the historical foundations and stylistic mechanics of pure cinema. Author Bruce Isaacs explores the potential of a philosophical and artistic approach most explicitly demonstrated by Hitchcock in his later films, beginning with Hitchcock's contact with the European avant-garde film movement in the mid-1920s. Tracing the evolution of a philosophy of pure cinema across Hitchcock's most experimental works - Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds, Marnie, and Frenzy - Isaacs rereads these works in a new and vital context. In addition to this historical account, the book presents the first examination of pure cinema as an integrated stylistics of mise en sc�ne, montage, and sound design. The films of so-called Hitchcockian imitators like Mario Bava, Dario Argento, and Brian De Palma are also examined in light of a provocative claim: that the art of pure cinema is only fully realized after Hitchcock.