Anthony Hopkins is wickedly delicious as Alfred Hitchcock in a new trailer for the movie “Hitchcock,” except for incredibly bad makeup. But Scarlett Johansson makes up for it as ravishing Janet Leigh.
The movie focuses on the making of Hitchcock’s classic film “Psycho,” which broke all the rules. When the suspense/horror film was released in 1960, it shocked audiences with its violence, sexuality and eccentric camera angles.
Although based on a 1990 book by Stephen Rebello about the making of “Psycho,” the movie shifts focus to the intensely complicated relationship between Hitchcock and his wife Alma Reville, played by Helen Mirren.
It’s hard to see how that will attract young moviegoers, who probably have had little exposure to Hitchcock or his work. But the subject matter and themes are so powerful it could score well with younger audiences.
The trailer shows Hopkins adeptly handling the filmmaker’s unique mannerisms and macabre sense of humor. Oddly, Hopkins, who is 74, plays Hitchcock as a 60-year-old, his age when he made “Psycho.”
Getting the film past movie censors adds to the picture’s dramatic tension. Hitchcock put up a substantial amount of the money himself to finance the project. It was a radical departure from his previous work and he used the film to experiment with a number of techniques that became standard in filmmaking.
In its day, the film received four Oscar nominations, has since been proclaimed a classic and is considered one of the best horror movies ever made.
“I’m just a man hiding in the corner with a camera … watching,” Hitchcock says at one point in the trailer, describing his filmmaking style.
Check out the trailer below and click here to follow TheImproper on Twitter for more movie updates.
