The Thriller - Its Fall and Rise

Alfred Hitchcock, we are told, was “the master of suspense.” The plots of his movies were filled with tension and sardonic wit, ironic twists that satisfy the audience’s appetite for drama. Yet even the great Hitchcock resorted to barely believable plot elements and he had trouble resolving his stories.

The ending of SUSPICION which he made for Selznick is a famous case in point. Is Cary Grant trying to murder his wife or is her suspicion unfounded? Legend has it that alternative endings were tested, and audiences would not buy Grant as guilty, so the happy one was patched together, undermining the mood crafted so coldbloodedly. It is notoriously unsatisfying and clumsy.

The famous cropduster scene in NORTH BY NORTHWEST is brilliant as a psychological and witty visual set-piece but ludicrous as a serious effort by clever spies to kill someone. The Master also over-relied on Freudian symbolism - action on trains, the color red, blondes - as shorthand for sexual obsession.

The plot of the darling of modern critics, VERTIGO, demands an impossible suspension of disbelief, hinging on Mac’s confusion about the woman’s identity, and her idiotic yielding to his obsessive re-make of her image, thus insuring her exposure. Of course, if Mac had seen a photo of his pal’s wife, dead or alive, there would have been no film at all. The ending, with Kim Novak’s unlikely paranoid induced fall from the tower, echoing the earlier episode of the fake fall, neatly wraps the story with a final crescendo in an ironic twist that, somehow, leaves us dangling.

Hitch liked the idea of falling as a means to terminate his villains so much that he couldn’t avoid the cliche. In SABOTEUR Norman Lloyd slips from Bob Cummings’ grasp and falls from The Statue of Liberty. NORTH BY NORTHWEST and TO CATCH A THIEF both climax in near falls. SHADOW OF A DOUBT ends with Uncle Charley’s grisly fall from a train. REAR WINDOW ends with another fall.

These endings satisfied the Master’s desire to build tension, use monumental settings, and mostly, to expose primal fears such as falling from great heights — but I prefer the endings of NOTORIOUS or THE BIRDS, in which nothing happens.

The modern thriller is one of the two or three most salable genres of contemporary film. (Teen and Horror being the other two.) Film makers have studied Hitchcock thoroughly and adapted his conventions to create the modern formula. Some have done better in constructing plausible plots within the conventions of the genre, but few have solved the “climax” problem.

The chase subs in for the fall in modern thrillers and similarly suffers from overkill. In fact, the entire thriller formula as a shell for thematic story telling is overused.

Hitchcock must be credited and blamed for fathering the innumerable sub-genres that are so common as to be tediously predictable:

1. The erotic thriller (UNFAITHFUL). 2. The psycho thriller (DRESSED TO KILL). 3. The serial killer thriller. (SEVEN, SILENCE OF THE LAMBS) 4. The cop thriller. (Any Al Pacino or Robert DeNiro movie) 5. The parapsychological thriller (THE RING, THE SIXTH SENSE). 6. The horror / monster thriller. (JAWS, ALIEN) 7. The Hit-Man Thriller (COLLATERAL).

Hitch of course pioneered the psycho thriller (PSYCHO, duh), the erotic thriller (MARNIE), the serial killer thriller (FRENZY). And he mastered other variants that later filmmakers have yet to equal: the ordinary guy vs. spy thriller (THE 39 STEPS, THE LADY VANISHES), the innocent man thriller (THE WRONG MAN, STRANGERS ON A TRAIN), the black comedy / thriller (THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY, FAMILY PLOT), the nearly perfect crime thriller (DIAL M FOR MURDER).

There are an infinite number of combinations of the variants. My personal favorite: the erotic / psycho-serial killer / cop thriller (most notable example BASIC INSTINCT; worst recent example, TAKING LIVES).

The jackpot is of course the Teen / horror / erotic / psycho-serial killer / cop thriller (SCREAM, HALLOWEEN, FRIDAY 13TH, WILD THINGS, etc.).

Only a few filmmakers have managed an original spin on the genre. David Lynch can fascinate us with his riddles, as in BLUE VELVET and the more enigmatic MULHOLLAND DRIVE. Bryan Singer's THE USUAL SUSPECTS combined mystery and thriller genres successfully. And in MEMENTO, Christopher Nolan spun the genre into reverse to surprise audiences.

Because this genre exploits our most elemental movie needs — risk, sex, violence (boo, kiss, bang), it will forever challenge movie makers and audiences — not to mention therapists.