An early, eerie, unsettling film from Brian De Palma, here just about getting his stylistic skills down-pat before his commercial breakthrough with "Carrie". I remember seeing this film not long after it was first released and it staying in my mind for a long time afterwards - this most recent viewing will have the same effect even if time does show up some of its deficiencies.
The film nods to Hitchcock's masterpiece "Vertigo" in many ways - Like James Stewart's Scotty Ferguson, Cliff Robertson here portrays a man so devastated by loss of a loved one that he goes to extremes to replace her with a living breathing substitute, expected to subsume her individuality and identity to his will. There are other Hitchcock motifs on board, like the utilisation of a prominent portrait of Robertson's wife and daughter, the insertion of an old church as a key location and of course, most obviously, Hitch's composer-in-residence Bernard Herrman's sweeping, almost suffocating orchestral score which seems to overlay nearly every scene. The famous Grace Kelly scissors scene from "Dial M For Murder" also gets a look-in when Robertson dispatches in self-defence his treacherous business partner-cum-friend John Lithgow.
De Palma's work here is highly stylised, with the whole possessing a dream-like quality, with smooth tracking shots the norm, culminating in the final revolving shots of Robertson and his reunited daughter at the conclusion as Herrman's music swells ever louder. The plotting is very complicated however and at times hard to swallow. The inference of Robertson's unwitting incestuous attraction to his grown-up daughter by the end is down-played but still disturbs plus it seems unlikely that bad guy Lithgow would go to such extremes to wrest control of the company away from long-time partner Robertson, especially over such a long period of time. But hey, I'm pretty sure that the plot to "Vertigo" has more than a few loose ends and unbelievable devices and while De Palma's film can't claim to be the cinematic great that "Vertigo" was, we have to remember the difference in the experience, knowledge and okay, skill of the two directors at the respective helms. Maybe De Palma very often was the Oasis to the Beatles if I can bring in a musical analogy but that shouldn't deny De Palma his due. At the very least he made near Hitchcock-class thrillers well into the 80's when the Master had long passed on
The acting is solid by all the players, especially Robertson in the key role as the grieving, driven widower unable to move on with his life until he has atoned for his earlier error in judgement. Perhaps John Lithgow is just a little too much cartoonish as the Southern gentleman baddie - he could almost be the template for JR Ewing from "Dallas", even down to the clothes.
This particular film was made only a few years after another haunting thriller of death loss and memory set in Italy, Nic Roeg's superior "Don't Look Now" with both films, like the best (or worst) of dreams, staying with you long after you've woken up.
The film nods to Hitchcock's masterpiece "Vertigo" in many ways - Like James Stewart's Scotty Ferguson, Cliff Robertson here portrays a man so devastated by loss of a loved one that he goes to extremes to replace her with a living breathing substitute, expected to subsume her individuality and identity to his will. There are other Hitchcock motifs on board, like the utilisation of a prominent portrait of Robertson's wife and daughter, the insertion of an old church as a key location and of course, most obviously, Hitch's composer-in-residence Bernard Herrman's sweeping, almost suffocating orchestral score which seems to overlay nearly every scene. The famous Grace Kelly scissors scene from "Dial M For Murder" also gets a look-in when Robertson dispatches in self-defence his treacherous business partner-cum-friend John Lithgow.
De Palma's work here is highly stylised, with the whole possessing a dream-like quality, with smooth tracking shots the norm, culminating in the final revolving shots of Robertson and his reunited daughter at the conclusion as Herrman's music swells ever louder. The plotting is very complicated however and at times hard to swallow. The inference of Robertson's unwitting incestuous attraction to his grown-up daughter by the end is down-played but still disturbs plus it seems unlikely that bad guy Lithgow would go to such extremes to wrest control of the company away from long-time partner Robertson, especially over such a long period of time. But hey, I'm pretty sure that the plot to "Vertigo" has more than a few loose ends and unbelievable devices and while De Palma's film can't claim to be the cinematic great that "Vertigo" was, we have to remember the difference in the experience, knowledge and okay, skill of the two directors at the respective helms. Maybe De Palma very often was the Oasis to the Beatles if I can bring in a musical analogy but that shouldn't deny De Palma his due. At the very least he made near Hitchcock-class thrillers well into the 80's when the Master had long passed on
The acting is solid by all the players, especially Robertson in the key role as the grieving, driven widower unable to move on with his life until he has atoned for his earlier error in judgement. Perhaps John Lithgow is just a little too much cartoonish as the Southern gentleman baddie - he could almost be the template for JR Ewing from "Dallas", even down to the clothes.
This particular film was made only a few years after another haunting thriller of death loss and memory set in Italy, Nic Roeg's superior "Don't Look Now" with both films, like the best (or worst) of dreams, staying with you long after you've woken up.