Hitchcock firsts

In terms of technique, take a look at the scene where the man (whom the film has led us to believe is the murderer) is pacing in his rented room. Rather than show us a prosaic shot of the man walking back and forth, Hitch shoots upward at the ceiling, where we see a chandelier gently swaying. Hitch then dissolves the ceiling, which is replaced by a pane of glass, through which we see the lodger nervously striding up and down -- a cinematic equivalent of the stage technique of a transparent scrim curtain. So you can see the influence of expressionism in Hitchcock's work right from the beginning.

reply share

add reply

formatting help

In terms of motifs,

It's the first of many films (Number Seventeen, Sabotage, Stagefright, The 1956 version of The Man Who Knew Too Much, Vertigo and North By Northwest) featuring people who play dual roles to conceal guilt or purpose and which hints at a link between schizophrenia and murder.

It's his first film centering on a sexual fetish.

It's the first of many to include shots of a black cat.

It's the first of several in which the murder weapon is a kitchen knife.

The spiralling staircase at the Bunting's boarding house resembles those in Frenzy, Blackmail, in the Newton's house in Shadow of a Doubt and the Bateses house in Psycho.

We see the first of the Hitchcock blonde heroines and the first innocent man on the run (39 Steps, Young and Innocent, Sabotage, North by Northwest.

The screaming mouth of the first murdered woman fills almost the whole screen, a recurrent motif that was used to greatest effect in Psycho.

reply share

add reply

formatting help

Many themes in this film recur repeatedly in Hitchcok's later films - Number 13 (number of the house), blonde heroine, black cat, brandy, staircase, dominant role of mother. Many things appear to have inspired Psycho! - the mother looks and dresses like "Mrs Bates", the bathroom scene, the strained (odd) relationship between the lodger and the staff (reversed in this case).

reply share

add reply

formatting help

An innocent man wrongfully suspected. Cruelty - in terms of the fate that (almost) befalls the Lodger. Sexual politics and, as commented in a piece on the film, sexuality being explored, Daisy moving from the basement of contented family life to the upper floor of mystery/danger/sexual desire. Finally the black humour that is so Hitchcock and one of the things I most love him for, e.g. the man who tries to scare the ladies at the begining when he covers his face with his coat as the Avenger is said to do; the drunk man at the bar, near the end, who can't run off in pursuit of the Lodger as the other inhabitants do. My favourite wet off the press!!

I'm a fountain of blood
In the shape of a girl

reply share

add reply

formatting help

Excellent question. This is from sfu.ca:

In 1966, Hitchcock commented that The Lodger "was the first time I exercised my style...you might almost say it was my first picture" (Spoto, 1992: 5). Indeed, one can view The Lodger as a veritable collection of Hitchcock firsts:

first film in which Hitchcock made a cameo appearance (two appearances, some claim)

first film in which Hitchcock introduced an unnamed central character (Rebecca)

first film in which the Police were depicted as occasionally inept, and possibly as untrustworthy as the villain (The 39 Steps, Blackmail)

first film in which brandy was taken for "medicinal" purposes

first film to feature Hitchcockian visual effects (the sound of the lodger’s footsteps illustrated visually through the use of a glass floor; Joe’s ruminations reflected back to him in the lodger’s footprint)

first film to be loosely based on a novel about a real-life serial killer (Jack the Ripper); Hitchcock repeated this with Psycho which was based on Robert Bloch’s novel about Ed Gein - and Frenzy, of course

first film to depict the relations among the major characters as triangular (Hitchcock even used stylized triangles on his titlecards for the film)

first film to portray the consequences of evil being brought into the safe refuge of the middle-class family (Shadow of a Doubt)

first film in which lovers are linked together with handcuffs (Saboteur, The 39 Steps)

first film in which a male character attempts the transformation of a woman by dressing her in clothing of his choosing (Vertigo)

first film in which Hitchcock was forced by studio pressure to alter his intended ending (he wanted the lodger to be guilty – or at least to leave his guilt or innocence unresolved - just as he wanted Cary Grant to be guilty in Suspicion)

The list could be extended further, but this gives some evidence of the significance that The Lodger came to assume in Hitchcock’s cinematic development. With The Lodger Hitchcock established the foundations for an artistic vision - and a philosophy of technique - that was to sustain his cinematic work for the next five decades. Indeed, there are few technical or thematic elements of Hitchcock’s mature work that cannot be found in nascent form in this black-and-white, silent film. Hence Rothman’s contention that "The Lodger is not an apprentice work but a thesis, definitively establishing Hitchcock’s identity as an artist" (Rothman, 1982: 7).

The Avenger, the unseen villain of the piece, is a quintessential Hitchcock MacGuffin. He puts the events of the story into motion, and sustains them only by the malevolence that seeps from the shadows he casts across the story. (In this respect he will reappear as the hold-up man thirty years later in The Wrong Man.) Yet in the course of its unfolding, The Lodger transforms itself from a police manhunt into a quite different tale.

------- __@
----- _`\<,_
---- (*)/ (*)------- ----__@
--------------------- _`\<,_
---- -----------------(*)/ (*)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~:*•.. ¤°.¸¸.•´¯`»nec spe,nec metu :*•.. ¤°.¸¸.•´¯`»

reply share

add reply

formatting help