Torn Curtain: Curtains for Alfred Hitchcock

First up, let me say that I think "Torn Curtain" is never less than an intelligent and artful film. Perhaps I can explore its greatnesses in other posts. Here's one: the cinematography, which Hitchcock purposely elected to do in gray colors through a gauze lens using natural light (or an approximation thereof) to give us a Hitchcock film that LOOKS like no other.

Meanwhile:

Books have been written on the making of "Psycho" and "Vertigo", but perhaps one could be written on "Torn Curtain." For it was Hitchcock's "Heaven's Gate," the movie that effectively ended his clout in Hollywood and left him, for the final 14 years of his life and only three movies, somewhat of an anachronistic "has been" in Hollywood. (Unfairly so, and "Frenzy" was a comeback even as it wasn't quite "good enough.")

The deal is this:

In 1960, the dawn of a new decade, Alfred Hitchcock was a Top Dog. He'd been given the biggest budget of his life to make the big hit "North by Northwest" in 1959, and in '60, "Psycho" was an even bigger hit, made on the cheap out of Hitch's pocket and hence able to make him a mega-millionaire. At the same time, he was a massively famous TV star -- globally -- thanks to his hit show "Alfred Hitchcock Presents."

Agent turned Universal chief Lew Wasserman lured Hitchcock away from Paramount and ensconsed him at Universal Studios, cutting a deal that sold Psycho and the TV show to the studio and made Hitchcock the third biggest stockholder of the company.

Hitchcock spent half of 1960, and all of 1961, trying to figure out how to "top Psycho." His answer was, eventually, "The Birds," but that movie barely made half of the gross of "Psycho," and studio boss Wasserman was concerned.

Wasserman was even more concerned in 1964, when Hitchcock offered up the drama "Marnie" and departed strongly from the youth-oriented shocks of "Psycho" and The Birds." Both "The Birds" and "Marnie" starred a previoulsy unknown woman named Tippi Hedren, whom Hitchcock had found on a TV commercial.

In 1965, as Hitchcock contemplated his next movie, Wasserman stepped in with some pressures: (1) Make a spy thriller in the "North by Northwest" tradition; (2) No Tippi Hedren; (3) Cast big stars.

Hitchcock relented. "Torn Curtain" was a spy movie. The two biggest young stars of the time were cast: Paul Newman and Julie Andrews (superhot with "Mary Poppins" and "The Sound of Music" just behind her.)

The public was told of the Newman/Andrews pairing, the spy movie genre (was another "North by Northwest" coming?), and, to add to the hype, the fact that "Torn Curtain" was "Hitchcock's 50th Film!"

But Hitchcock was facing some hard new facts of life. Since "North by Northwest" and "Psycho," a new young generation had emerged. Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove" had set a new standard for geopolitical suspense (and comedy.) The Beatles were hot...and so was James Bond, a spy (in the Hitchcock tradition) whose every movie was filled with action, start to finish. On TV, spy shows like "The Man From UNCLE," "I Spy," and "The Wild Wild West" (James Bond goes west) were creating a hipper, faster feel to an old genre.

It all came together in ruination for Hitchcock when "Torn Curtain" came out in the summer of 1966. Hitchcock tried to warn critics: he hated James Bond movies, which stole from "North by Northwest." The crop-duster chase in "North by Northwest" was now a cliche, with all sorts of other machines chasing spies (a helicopter chasing Bond in "From Russia With Love.") "Torn Curtain," Hitchcock opined, would be a series of "incidents" (ala "The 39 Steps") and would be a grim expose of the grimy realities of spying.

And "Torn Curtain" certainly was that. Gone were the excitements of the crop duster and a chase across Mount Rushmore. In their place were the long and grueling murder of a sympathetic middle-aged villain by a reluctant Paul Newman. The whole movie was cerebral, low-key.

But "Torn Curtain" had other problems. Big money was spent on Newman and Andrews, so the whole movie was shot cheap in L.A., mainly on the Universal backlot but also at USC and Long Beach harbor (filling in for East German locales.)

Meanwhile, though Newman was an intriguing new Hitchcock hero (a kind of anti-heroic, wise-cracking Rebel Cary Grant), Julie Andrews fit neither with Newman nor with Hitchcock. (Try to imagine Andrews in "Notorious"; "Rear Window"; "North by Northwest" or "Psycho." No can do. "Suspicion," maybe.)

"Torn Curtain" was subdued enough against "North by Northwest." Against "Thunderball" and "Arabesque" and (the silly/sexy) "The Silencers" and "Gambit," it was downright square (despite its serious thematic concerns and very grim central murder sequence.)

The movie made some money on the strenght of Newman, Andrews, and Hitchcock. But not that much. It faded.

And that was it for Alfred Hitchcock. His TV show had gone off the air in 1965, the year before "Torn Curtain." He was no longer "current." Stars no longer wanted to work with him; they didn't expect to be in either a classic or a hit with Hitchcock at the helm.

And Universal no longer budgeted top dollar for a Hitchcock film.

Hitchcock had been making about a movie a year. After "Torn Curtain," he took a few years off. Returned with "Topaz" in 1969, just in time to be declared "over for the seventies." He surprised us in the the 70's with the well-reviewed, gripping "Frenzy" (1972), but it, too, had no stars in it, and was considered "Hitchcock's little movie." He took a long four years off before offering the smaller still "Family Plot" in 1976, ten years after "Torn Curtain," a much-honored but no longer relevant man.

In retrospect, "Torn Curtain" looks much better than its reputation. The murder scene was saluted by Sam Peckinpah, Jonathan Demme, the Coen Brothers, Bryan Singer, and others, as an All Time Great Hitchcock Scene. The "chalkboard duel" is the epitome of smart filmmaking -- even as we don't understand the formulas, we know exactly what is going on at all times. The bus scene, though flawed (bad process; silly moments), is a cerebral treat of suspense. And so on.

But back in hip, mod, "new" 1966, "Torn Curtain" looked like Hitchcock's Swan Song. I think it broke his spirit, really. He made more films, but even he knew he was coasting on his reputation by then.

As important as "Psycho" was for Hitchcock in 1960 as a "peak," "Torn Curtain" a mere six years later was a valley. It was a fickle decade, and Hitchcock paid the price.

None of this is to say that "Torn Curtain" is one of the great Hitchcock films. It is not. But it is by no means a disaster, or a bad film, or a dumb one.

It was simply the movie on which Hitchcock's luck ran out.