Hitchcock's Unsung Masterpiece
From 1958 to 1963, Alfred Hitchcock made, arguably, a crowning group of masterpieces, each one very different from the one before, and yet oddly intersecting in theme, character, icons: Vertigo (1958), North by Northwest (1959), Psycho (1960), and The Birds (1963.) Masterpieces all (though I think "The Birds" was a bit below the others in quality of script).
But right before that immortal run of classics comes "The Wrong Man." And I think it belongs right up there with them. In its own way and for its own reasons.
"The Wrong Man" isn't a grand adventure like "North by Northwest" or a super-shocker like "Psycho." It doesn't play in the lush Technicolor dreamscape of "Vertigo" and it has none of the technical astonishments of "The Birds."
But "The Wrong Man" was made by the same team that made those movies after it: Hitchcock, music man Bernard Herrmann, cinematographer Robert Burks, editor George Tomasini. It LOOKS like those later films. It SOUNDS like those later films. It FEELS like those later films. And it predicts those later films. Consider:
1. In "The Wrong Man," Vera Miles has a breakdown and Henry Fonda, after being briefed on her condition by a shrink (Colonel Klink of Hogan's Heroes) leaves her in the asylum, walking down a darkening hall. In "Vertigo," James Stewart has a breakdown and Barbara Bel Geddes, after being briefed on his conditon by a shrink (Banker Drysdale of the Beverly Hillbillies), leaves her in the asylum, walking down a darkening hall.
2. In North by Northwest, New Yorker Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is wrongly accused of murder. In The Wrong Man, New Yorker Manny Ballestrero is wrongly accused of robbery. Oh, Roger's a few social stratums up from Manny, but they are both 50's New York men. Maybe Roger heard some music that Manny played at the Stork Club one night. And each man has a "uniform": for Roger, a silver-gray suit; for Manny, a heavy overcoat and a big hat.
3. "The Wrong Man," just like "Psycho" of two years later, is filmed in black-and-white, and postulates a bleak workaday world in which just trying to make ends meet is a grinding challenge, and a meager attempt to escape (on vacation, with money)...meets with criminal persecution. Also, Vera Miles is in both movies.
4. In "The Birds" as in "The Wrong Man," the villainy isn't a "he" or a "she." It's an "it": an oppressive universe that rises up against the heroes without rhyme or reason, with no ability on the hero's part to right that universe.
5. (Bonus) "Marnie" has a famous bad painting of a ship by an apartment house on Baltimore Harbor. "The Wrong Man" has a great REAL shot of a huge ship by an apartment house on New York Harbor.
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All of these interconections and predictions just show how "The Wrong Man" fits perfectly into Hitchcock's oveure at the time.
But what makes it a masterpiece, to me, is Hitchcock's trenchant and unrelenting attempt here to tranform the "wrong man nightmare" of his entertainments into something oppressively REAL. The first 45 minutes or so of "The Wrong Man" -- as Manny is grabbed at his doorstep, paraded in front of witnesses, interrogated, arrested, and put into a tiny cell -- are possibly the most terrifying minutes in a Hitchcock movie this side of "Psycho" or "Frenzy."
There's real brilliance in how the friendly cops keep calling Manny "Chris." That's because the name on his license is Christopher Emmanuel Ballestrero, so they ASSUME he's Chris. We all assume things about people -- but when the cops assume, you're in real trouble.
Many legal protections for suspects have been put into place since "The Wrong Man" came out in '56 (based on a real '53 case.) But that doesn't remove the bureaucratic terrors of a system which -- once it has Manny in it clutches -- demands that he pull himself out. Hire a lawyer. Find witnesses. Go to trial. Hope you win.
After opening as a terrifying look at wrongful imprisonment (and I strongly believe that Manny IS innocent), "The Wrong Man" becomes a heartbreaking member of a key late 50's genre: the mental breakdown movie.
It's never been sadder than in "The Wrong Man." Look at the "Hitchcock rhyme": the first time Manny comes home to beautiful Rose in his bedroom, she is a vision of love and sexuality. The next time -- months after his arrest and trial preparation of lost witnesses and evidence -- she's in the same place, but all beauty is drained from her. She's going, going, gone.
Hitchcock's visual command in this film is as sure and powerful as in any other masterpiece of his. Look at the huge profile shots of the two cops blocking Manny on either side in their car (more ominous than the bad spies who block Cary Grant in the car in "North by Northwest.") The circling camera in Fonda's cell, and his trapped, desperate eyes through the cell slot. The dissolve -- on the portrait of Jesus to whom Manny likely prays -- to the right man's face.
Bernard Herrmann's music is more muted and "held back" than in the great Hitchcock films to follow; but as usual, it FITS. It is tense, forlorn, nervous, depressed music.
Hitchcock was here influenced by both Italian neo-realism ("The Bicycle Thief") and New York/New Jersey kitchen sink realism ("On the Waterfront"/"Marty.") The connection to "Marty" is most strong. Manny has Marty's same mother. (Come to think of it, Manny is an Italian. Why didn't Hitchcock cast Ernest Borgnine in this part? Or is he not Italian? Frank Sinatra?)
Hitchcock wanted to work with Henry Fonda for many years. He sought him for "Saboteur" and "Lifeboat," but to no avail. The two men only worked this once, but the match of Henry Fonda to THIS Hitchcock role was perfect, even if he wasn't really Italian-American. He's a good, sad, decent man. An actor of films of social justice. And yet...with just enough inhuman robotic movement of face and voice to suggest he MIGHT be a robber.
Hitchcock "lightly launched" Vera Miles in this film. He wanted to showcase her in "Vertigo," but lost her to pregnancy. Kim Novak was great in that film; but Vera Miles is great in THIS film. So beautiful, so innocent...so forlorn...so destroyed. Quite believably. (Miles would come back more famously in "Psycho," but in a much less in-depth role.)
A brilliant film. One of Hitchcock's most personal films. Likely his saddest film (even sadder than "Vertigo.") Great by any measure.