MOVIE REVIEW: Hitchcock

 Hitchcock

(2012)

IMDB

Summary

In 1959, Alfred Hitchcock and his wife, Alma, are at the top of their creative game as filmmakers amid disquieting insinuations about it being time to retire. To recapture his youth's artistic daring, Alfred decides his next film will adapt the lurid horror novel, Psycho, over everyone's misgivings. Unfortunately, as Alfred self-finances and labors on this film, Alma finally loses patience with his roving eye and controlling habits with his actresses. When an ambitious friend lures her to collaborate on a work of their own, the resulting marital tension colors Alfred's work even as the novel's inspiration haunts his dreams.

Review

'Hitchcock' features two strong leads in Anthony Hopkins and Helen Mirren, but unfortunately the movie itself is alright, but had the potential to be much better.  Instead of focusing on the what happened during the making of the film 'Psycho', the film focuses more on Hitchcock's marriage to Alma and his personal life.  Which isn't necessarily a bad thing since Hopkins and Mirren are great on screen together, but there's a brief subplot in the movie which involves Mirren's Alma working privately with a friend on a screenplay and when Hitchcock finds out he becomes jealous.  I think less focus on that subplot and more time on the movie set would have helped this film.  Hopkins was good in the film and definitely looked the part of Hitchcock, thanks to a little help from the makeup department, but Helen Mirren, who continues to be great in everything that she's in, shined the most in this movie.  I thought Scarlett Johansson's role of Janet Leigh and Jessica Biel's role of Vera Miles were fine, and didn't either make or break the movie.  The film was decent, but Hopkins and Mirren made it much better.

...AND SIMPLY PUT...PRETTY GOOD BUT IT COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER.

WORTH A LOOK. B

Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Helen Mirren, Scarlett Johansson, James D'Arcy, Jessica Biel, Michael Stuhlbarg
Director: Sacha Gervasi
Rating: PG-13 for some violent images, sexual content and thematic material
In Theaters: November 23, 2012 (limited) and December 14, 2012 (nationwide)
On BLU-RAY and DVD: March 12, 2013