'Frenzy' & 'Marnie'

I count 16 Alfred Hitchcock films in the 1,001 list. By my estimation, that's the most for any one director. I've reviewed all but about six or so.

Frenzy and Marnie represent two of Hitchcock's final films. The latter (1964) was Hitch's third to the last American film and the former (1972) was his second to the last for his career. But it also signaled his return to making a film in England. Indeed, it's extraordinarily English. Especially compared to the previous 30 which were extraordinarily American.

Marnie is the most interesting because of all the little stories that went with it. It's essentially a retelling of Psycho except Marnie gets caught and there's horses.

Still, it stars the massively unattractive Tippi Hedren, who had starred in The Birds a year before. This is upsetting because Hitchcock wanted Grace Kelly, and she was set to do it, but by then she was the princess of Monaco and her people objected to her playing a criminal.

During filming, Hitchcock and Hedren had a falling out. Rumors were that there was an intermediary that served as a go-between during production. I find this hard to believe on Hitchcock's part. The pair never worked together again or spoke.

Sean Connery is another story. He was primed to do a Hitchcock film, but reportedly balked at Notorious and North by Northwest (both superior films) but Connery felt he'd be further typecast as a spy-type. So he did the inferior Marnie. Connery's quoted as saying that he likes the movie with certain "reservations." Which just certifies him as being a prick.

Marnie proved to be a bit of a milestone for Hitchcock and signaled the end of an era. Both his longtime editor and cinematographer died following the film. His musical composer was fired in his next movie. All his security blankets were closed.

Thus, films like Frenzy come off as being completely different. Almost unrecognizable as Hitchcock unless you just know it is. It's very modern, lacks his typical nuances and the killer casts he was able to procure.