Word: hitchcock
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Director Claude Chabrol, a disciple of Hitchcock, shoots more for nuance than frisson. It is his wily variations on a hoary theme that give La Femme Infidèle its own small distinction. A wealthy Parisian insurance man (Michel Bouquet) takes casual note that his supple young wife (Stephane Audran) acts rather nervous when he interrupts her on the telephone. He engages a private detective to follow her on her shopping trips to Paris and has his worst suspicions quickly confirmed: she is having an affair. Her paramour is a writer (Maurice Ronet) who lives mostly off his "independent means...
...PERENNIAL success of Hitchcock at the box office shows fear to be a popular commodity. In the American film world, shock and suspense are synonymous with Hitchcock. In France, the leading master of fear is Henri-Georges Clouzot...
...Wages of Fear (1953) has been generally and rightly acclaimed as Clouzot's most accomplished film to date. The sharply and subtly drawn development of the often implicit relationships between characters takes place in a cauchemaresque and lurid atmosphere to form a totality more impressive than Hitchcock's greatest. For Hitchcock, the most important thing is suspense, so that many other things, such as depth and flexibility of character, are sacrificed to the single aim of scaring the collective pants off his audience. Suspense is an essential element in Clouzot as well, but the three-dimensionality of his characters...
Meyer has not been treated as extensively by critics as say, Godard or Hitchcock have, but recently Vincent Canby decided to spend a few inches on him. Now I'm still so dumb about the cinema that I don't know whether I should say "movie" or "film" or "picture." but I know when I've caught Canby with his foot in his mouth. Meyer would be all right, Canby said, if only he could get his mind off sex. Hah. What makes Meyer so great is that he can think of nothing else...
Characteristically for Hitchcock, this masterpiece of sympathetic shooting is followed by barren exercises. The Birds, Marnie, and Torn Curtain are as abstract as their heroes are cold and two-dimensional. Hitchcock transcended his fascination with formal schemes only rarely...