Marnie is the story of a woman who is a thief because of a traumatic event in her childhood and of the man who helps her to face her past so they will have a future together. As the film opens, Marnie's former employer Strutt complains bitterly to the police (and to his client, Mark Rutland) about the trusted and beautiful employee who robbed him blind. Strutt's anger is as much over Marnie's frigid demeanor on the job as about the loss of his funds. Meanwhile, Marnie changes her identity and, as if in celebration, goes to ride her beloved horse, Forio, who is boarded at stables. Marnie then visits her mother in Baltimore. At Mrs. Edgar's house, the tension between the two women is revealed: Marnie resents the little neighbor girl who seems to have taken her place in her mother's affections, and she exhibits a strange, panicked reaction when she sees red flowers backgrounded by white curtains. Mrs. Edgar is obviously proud of her daughter, but there are allusions to the repression of a mysterious event in the women's shared past.
Armed with her new identity, Marnie relocates to Philadelphia and secures a job at Mark Rutland's firm. (Mark is instrumental in her being hired and may remember her from Strutt's.) Marnie proves herself a trusted employee as she slyly uncovers particulars about the company safe and its contents. She seems in control except for freaking out when she spills red ink on her white blouse and when, working overtime for Mark, she becomes terrified during a thunderstorm. Mark comforts her during the latter episode and begins in earnest his "courtship" of this strangely haunted woman.
Marnie and Mark share trips to the race track (where a former employer recognizes and threatens to expose her) and to Mark's family estate, where she meets his family. As Mark's intimacy with her progresses, Marnie reacts to the closeness by staying after work to clean out the office safe. After discovering the robbery and replacing the funds, Mark locates Marnie riding Forio. During the trip back to Philadelphia, Mark pumps her about her past and blackmails her into marriage, leaving Marnie with a choice between him or the police. Their honeymoon is spent aboard ship, where Marnie's frigidity keeps Mark at bay until one night when he rapes her. The next morning he finds her face down in the ship's pool, but she is still alive. The honeymoon thus cut short, they tenuously return to Philadelphia.
Back at the Rutland estate, Mark delivers Forio to Marnie as his sister-in-law, Lil, watches. While Marnie happily rides off, Lil reveals information she has learned about Marnie's mother and offers her help to Mark. Although Mark's detective locates Mrs. Edgar, Marnie's troubles worsen as the nightmare she has been plagued with recurs. Mark attempts to uncover the source of her terror through engaging her in psychological free association, but all Marnie can ultimately do is cry for help. Meanwhile, Lil, ever jealous of Mark's wife, has invited Marnie's old boss Strutt to a party the Rutlands are giving. At the party, Strutt recognizes Marnie, and she panics and tries to run away. Mark stops her and reassures her that he will deal with Strutt.
The next day, during an arranged fox hunt for the assembled party, the frenzy of the dogs upsets Marnie. She focuses on the red hunting jacket of one of the riders, and, with her, Forio bolts off across the countryside. Lil observes all this and follows. Forio falls after attempting a jump and is not able to get up. Lil, arriving on the scene, is unsuccessful in persuading Marnie not to shoot the horse. Marnie, in shock from the death of her horse, returns to the house (where Strutt and Mark are coming to terms), gets Mark's office keys, and proceeds to the Rutland office where she again attempts robbery. This time, however, she is physically unable to take the money. Mark prevents further tragedy by appropriating the gun and suggests they pay a visit to Marnie's mother.
Arriving at Mrs. Edgar's house during a thunderstorm, Mark confronts Marnie's mother with the facts of Marnie's frigidity and Mrs. Edgar's own prostitution. Marnie seems to regress into herself as a child and, in flashback, relives the killing of the sailor who had been her mother's customer. She reveals that, although Mrs. Edgar took the blame for his death, it was actually Marnie who struck the fatal blows, attempting to protect her mother from his advances. Thus, the sailor's blood is revealed to be the source of Marnie's mysterious "red trauma." Mrs. Edgar reveals she believed Marnie's loss of memory about the "accident" to be a sign of forgiveness, and from then on, she vowed, she would rear Marnie differently, "... decent." Marnie recognizes that, of course, she is "decent" but has also become a liar and a thief. Mark recognizes that Marnie stole because she could not get love. As they leave, Mark tells Marnie she will not go to prison after he tells her story. They walk out of the house, past the children playing on the sidewalk, into the gradually clearing day.
In examining POV for this paper, I have deconstructed Marnie into discrete segments: a prologue followed by seventeen separate units, each of which was determined by the criterion of a unifying advancement in the narrative. Each segment was then analyzed for POV in order to determine the cumulative effect of characters' vision on the narrative in that particular segment. (See Figure 1.) By using this method (rather than only focusing on individual POV episodes), I will be able to tie POV occurrences more closely to narrational development which will facilitate understanding the various positions (of the characters, the viewer, and the filmmaker) that must be accounted for.
The system detailed by Edward Branigan in his seminal investigation of cinematic POV19 will be be used here to analyze individual POV's within the discrete segments. (His terminology is used throughout this paper.) Basically, Branigan identifies POV as being comprised of two fundamental shots: shot A contains one or more characters who look off-screen (the point/glance shot); shot B shows what the character sees (the from point/object shot).20 The power of the shots lies in the ability of the viewer to make the connection between them, to see the character looking in shot A and to read shot B as the object of the character's glance. Some basic forms of POV that Branigan identifies are:
|
usual POV |
A,B |
shot A is followed by shot B |
|
discovered POV |
B,A |
shot A follows shot B |
|
closed POV |
A,B,A |
shot A is repeated after shot B |
|
continuing POV |
A,B,A,B,... |
in return to shot A, character again glances off-screen for sustained viewpoint |
|
multiple POV |
A,B,C,B... |
several characters see same object |
|
reciprocal POV (shot-reverse shot) |
A,B,A,B... |
alternating close ups of two (shot-reverse shot) characters in conversation21 |
Of course, a particular form of POV may be used to generate a specific effect in the viewer. Closed POV, for instance, uses the repetition of shot A to emphasize what has been seen and to signal the end of subjectivity, while continuing POV tends to implicate the viewer more in the experience of the character.
Taken as a whole, the individual instances of POV which comprise Marnie's most focalized segments describe in microcosm a pattern which adheres to my preceding description of Hitchcock's directing style as fluctuating among different aspects of the narrative. While watching the film, the viewer is constantly shifting allegiances among various subjective points of view in order to gain narrational and psychological information. Since it is by focalizing on characters that we gain POV information, it is my intention in this paper to trace (both within the segments I have identified and, ultimately, extrasegmentally) the shifts in intimacy with various characters which are generated by Hitchcock's use of the device.
The character with whom we achieve the greatest intimacy through POV is Marnie. I will trace Marnie's POV activity throughout the film, paying particular attention to segments which are most important to the narrative development of the film as a whole. In the same way, I will also investigate POV for the other major character, Mark. While these two characters provide the strongest evidence of individual POV in the film, Hitchcock's use of the multiple POV form (where more than one character sees the same object) is also crucial. In Marnie, multiple POV is used in two important ways: 1) we see what two or more characters in the same shot see when they look off-screen; and 2) a variation on the classic closed POV segment where in the return to shot A another character is substituted for the one in the original A shot, implying that the second character has seen what the first one has. These three main areas of investigation --- Marnie's POV, Mark's POV, and multiple POV--- considered from a narrative standpoint, will comprise the bulk of my analysis of the film.
Typical narrative development dictates that information about characters be disseminated early in a story in order to provide the necessary base on which to build appropriate responses as the plot develops. Marnie follows this rule but, as is characteristic of Hitchcock, the presentation of the material is multi-layered, even ambiguous. The character of Marnie is tantalizingly introduced in the prologue. The first shot of the film (after the credit segment) shows Marnie from the rear, walking along the platform of a train station but, because of the camera angle, her face is hidden from us. The withholding of Marnie's face is the first indication that her identity is suspicious, but it also serves to objectify her in a curious way: she is both seen and not seen, the object of the camera's gaze, yet partially able to hide from it. A direct cut links this space with a scene of outrage: the employer whom Marnie has just robbed cries out in anguish at being so fooled by this woman. As he talks to the police, he describes her beauty in too-exacting detail --- obsessed, it would seem, with her looks as much as with the money she has stolen. The description given by Strutt is augmented by commentary by Mark, who appears at the office (he is Strutt's client) by chance, but he most assuredly remembers "... the brunette with the legs ..." who stole the money. The scene ends with Mark's thoughtful look towards the camera, almost as though he is creating an image in his mind of Marnie from the words that have been spoken. But then there is a direct cut to Marnie walking along a hotel corridor, again photographed from the rear, again with her face obscured by the camera angle. (This is the shot referred to earlier where Hitchcock makes his cameo appearance.) The different spaces depicted in the two shots preclude an interpretation of this being Mark's POV of Marnie, but some undeniable elements are there: a shot of a male glancing off-screen is followed by a shot of a beautiful woman. Yet it is Marnie's control of the situation which keeps her from being the object of Mark's gaze.
Raymond Bellour, in commenting on Marnie's predicament here, says "... the theft displays itself as the other side of sex: the woman's reply to the aggression, perpetuated through the image, which she experiences as object."22 Certainly, by means of the theft, Marnie is in a powerful position. She also, by means of her absence, controls POV: while the men create her image verbally, she has removed her literal appearance from their view. (Marnie's "sins" are thus clearly quantified: she steals money and she withholds sex. In this case, visual pleasure is denied to both the men in the narrative and those in the audience.) But after Marnie enters the hotel room, she takes control of POV in a different way ... or does she? Marnie's face has still not been disclosed, and a series of shots reveal the foci of her attention as she changes identity: suitcases are switched, a new Social Security card is chosen, the black dye from her hair runs down the drain. These actions are viewed from Marnie's perspective before we see her face. And, then, the culmination of these first filmic moments: Marnie raises her head from the wash basin and, triumphantly, faces the camera. It is not at all certain that this shot may be construed as shot A in a discovered POV structure (where shot A follows shot B). In fact, at this moment she is no longer in physical proximity to the suitcases, etc., but the shot of the dye swirling down the drain is what she must have seen directly before raising her eyes to the camera. (The fact that she upsweeps her newly blonde hair to keep it from obstructing the camera's view of her face subtly layers an additional linkage over the two shots.) If this is POV, it is rather insubstantial; if it is not POV, the viewer is manipulated as though it were: the shots from Marnie's perspective and the purposeful postponement of seeing her face provoke curiosity and tension in addition to a shared sense of intimacy with the character.
In these first moments, therefore, Hitchcock presents the narrative's two main characters, but the style in which they are introduced is as complex as the protagonists themselves. Mark seems fascinated, even bemused, by Marnie and her illegal actions. His is an unusual stance, especially when coupled with his apparent (director-like) ability to conjure a vision of a beautiful woman (even if it is only a limited view). Marnie's introduction is even more complex. The men who discuss her are verbally assaulting her, but the coup she has orchestrated deprives them of more than money. While Mark seems able to control Marnie's image, her power is amply demonstrated by her manipulation of the patriarchal marks of identity which are indicative of "a woman's place" in the society. Ultimately, of course, it is Hitchcock who decides the disposition of the shots, but Marnie's power seems so great that she can withhold her former identity from us: the viewer never sees Marnie's face as a brunette. The murkiness of the POV device at this juncture (the over-the-shoulder shots which detail her change of public personae) may be read as appropriate for a woman whose identity is being reborn as we watch. Interpreting these shots as Marnie's POV lends an almost conspiratorial tone to her actions. In this segment, we are privileged in sharing Marnie's giddy sense of freedom and autonomy, and we gain a sense of the self-deception which haunts her. Hitchcock uses variations on standard POV devices in the prologue and first segment to reveal complex information about Marnie (and Mark) to us and to lay the foundations upon which the rest of the film will be constructed.
After the opening scenes of Marnie, Hitchcock adopts a more straightforward approach to POV for the purpose of deepening our relationship with the main protagonist. Soon after Marnie's change of identity, the occasion of her first on-screen visit to her mother's house sketches the tension between the two women which is necessary to succeeding plot development, but it is through POV that the viewer is guided to assimilate this information from Marnie's perspective and to empathize with her predicament. Hitchcock uses the device to draw us deeper into Marnie's world.
Two distinct forms of the point of view figure dominate this segment: shot-reverse shot and continuing POV. Marnie shares all shot-reverse shot POV's and, most importantly, is the only character in the segment to sustain major episodes of continuing POV. Marnie's continuing POV not only allows the viewer to be introduced to the house through Marnie's eyes, it also gives us vital information about her which certainly could not be conveyed as powerfully if presented objectively. For example, in the midst of Marnie's first continuing POV series of the segment she embraces her mother and looks off-screen. The shot that follows shows us what she is looking at: a vase with red gladioli backgrounded by white curtains. It is only upon the return to Marnie's face (the return to shot A) that the screen becomes suffused with red; her reaction is most important here (more so than what she sees), and Marnie's subsequent actions confirm the inner turmoil which the coloring of the frames signals. One of the central mysteries of the film is thus introduced through highly expressionistic means (the red coloration) layered over the subjective presentation of the information (the use of POV).
The other predominant POV figure in this segment, shot-reverse shot, works in conjunction with Marnie's continuing POV to reinforce the basic narrative thrust. The segment begins at the front door to the house with shot-reverse shot cutting between Marnie and Jessie, the little neighbor girl who, we subsequently learn, Marnie fears is her rival for her mother's affections. The device is used here, aided by dialogue and acting, to effect an oppositional tone and to set the stage for Marnie's interactions with her mother. All subsequent shot-reverse shots are shared by Marnie and her mother, and they reinforce the idea of turmoil between the two women. In one instance, Marnie and her mother discuss young Jessie (Marnie: "...every time I come home ... she's roosting here ..."), and the camera cutting between them emphasizes their dichotomous views. Moreover, additional shots of Jessie are enfolded within the shot-reverse shot structure in the form of the mother's closed POV: for example, during shot-reverse shot between Marnie and her mother, the camera is on the mother (shot A) when she shifts her gaze from Marnie and looks off-screen in a different direction; cut to Jessie (shot B); after the camera cuts back to the mother (return to shot A), she shifts her gaze back in the original direction towards Marnie, and shot-reverse shot continues between the two women. Not only does this tactic point towards Marnie's position as her mother's second choice, but because Jessie resembles what Marnie must have looked like as a child, Hitchcock's cutting here makes Jessie the link to the unacknowledged mystery that stands between Marnie and her mother.
Shot-reverse shot in this segment, like continuing POV, is sometimes handled expressionistically. During a crucial confrontation between Marnie and her mother in the kitchen, during shots of Marnie the camera repeatedly tracks in from a medium close-up to a close up, thus emphasizing the impact that her mother's rejection has on her. Most emphatically expressionistic, though, is the final shot-reverse shot of the segment. As Marnie is waking from her traumatic dream, her mother appears at the top of the stairs at her bedroom door. Marnie is lying in bed, her mother is in shadow at the top of the stairs. The shot-reverse shot which follows is murkily presented: at first, Marnie has her eyes closed, and her mother is in such deep shadow for the duration that her eyes are never seen. That the shots are to be interpreted as shot-reverse shot, however, seems clear: camera angles, the rhythm of the cutting, and the positions of the characters in the frames support this interpretation over other possibilities (such as this being Marnie's POV). But the two women are at such odds with each other that by this point they cannot see clearly. The shadowy expressionism evidenced here points to the dark gulf that lies between them and to their inability to communicate. The last shot of the segment is cold as ice: Marnie's mother turns her back on her daughter and walks down the stairs: Marnie sees both her mother and her mother's shadow moving along the wall. This image and the other shots in this series focusing on the mother are upsetting partly because they hearken back to other powerful and dark Hitchcock women: Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca, the "woman on wheels"; Mrs. Bates in Psycho and her descent into the fruit cellar; and, most chillingly, the darkness, silhouetted form, and framing recall the nun at the end of Vertigo who causes Judy to plunge to her death.
The beginning of Marnie, therefore, roots the viewer securely in Marnie's world, and provides intriguing hints about this woman and her lifestyle which prove to be far from judgmental. Rather, the viewer is brought, as literally as possible, into her position and allowed to see events from Marnie's perspective. But not only does the camera take Marnie's physical place, it is also used expressionistically to deepen the identification. Because the narrational information at this point is partial and cryptic, and because it is presented sympathetically to bolster identification with Marnie's psychological dilemma, she is the primary character with whom POV identification is established. Unquestionably, as the groundwork for the narrative is laid, the emotional and informational heart of Hitchcock's use of the POV device centers on Marnie.
Thus far in the narrative, Marnie's professional "performance" (for such it is) has been the subject of discussion only. Although the viewer knows what to expect because of Strutt's tirade during the prologue, up to this point Hitchcock has revealed Marnie on a personal, not a professional, level. After she leaves her mother's house, the three segments which immediately follow form an arc of narrative which encompasses her professional life: in the first of these segments, Marnie looks for a job; in the second, she plays the perfect employee, almost always in control; and, in the third, the revelation of her "disability" undermines her autonomy and ability to work. In these segments POV traces and mimics the narrative's trajectory: when Marnie is in control, her POV predominates; when her autonomy weakens, POV reflects this, too.
Marnie's job search, like her visit to her mother's, makes use of the POV figures of shot-reverse shot and continuing POV, with Marnie as the structural center of the scene. All POV's involve her, whether she is the perpetrator or the victim of the gaze; but, most often, she is the active, not passive, participant. All shot-reverse shot occurrences involve Marnie and a woman, either the secretary at Rutland's or Lil who is Mark's sister-in-law: Marnie seems to be on equal ground here. But instances of continuing POV are more complicated. While Marnie's POV has priority, it is divided between two main foci: the subject of her sustained gaze is either Mark (is she sexually attracted to him or is he merely the man in charge to her?) or obtaining the practical information she will need to complete her planned robbery (e.g., observing where her boss-to-be keeps the combination to the safe). Meanwhile, Mark's continuing POV's of Marnie hearken back to his dreamy close up at the end of the prologue and leave questionable whether his interest in her is sparked by his memory of "Marion Holland," the persona Marnie used when she robbed Strutt.
Mark's interest in her continues after he has obtained the job for her. As he watches her at her desk, he also possibly observes the careful way she watches everything around her. The specter of the robbery at Strutt's may be haunting him; clearly, he is sexually attracted to her. Although Mark's POV is certainly a factor in building tension, Marnie's POV is more central in this segment, too. That she holds her own, both narratively and in terms of POV, with her co-worker and boss is evidenced through Hitchcock's use of shot-reverse shot. In addition, our access to Marnie's closed and continuing POV's clearly paints a picture of a woman with a mission. In both shot-reverse shot and individual POV situations Marnie's energy is devoted to uncovering the secrets which will allow her proposed theft to succeed. The one exception to this demonstrates that her control is not as complete as she imagines: the device of the screen suffusing with red during her POV is used once again to signal her distress as she sees the red ink she has dropped diffuse over the sleeve of her white blouse. The suggestion of the undermining of Marnie's autonomy is thus present in this segment, in a peripheral way, in both the gaze of Mark (which threatens her whether he looks at her sexually or suspiciously) and in the trauma which she carries within herself.
These particular threats to Marnie's self-sufficiency become more menacing, even to the point of effectively paralyzing her, when she works overtime for Mark and the extent of her disability is brought to the forefront during a thunderstorm. A different strategy is adopted here by Hitchcock. While the scene starts with Marnie's continuing POV of Mark and the various artifacts of his zoological interests, it soon segues into a more equitable shot-reverse shot formation, which is in turn replaced by Mark's continuing POV of Marnie's distress over the storm which has been building. (Interestingly enough, while the screen is not suffused in red during the B shots, Marnie's face is colored by the lightning in a way that is reminiscent of the expressionist device. In this case, of course, Marnie is the object of the gaze; Mark is the one who is looking.) So, as Marnie loses control, gradually Mark seems to acquire what she has relinquished. Indeed, the remainder of Marnie's POV activity here is limited to two closed POV episodes detailing the lightning and her reaction to it. The last POV of the scene belongs to Mark as he sees the branch which has crashed through the window. Upon returning to his face, the camera has moved into extreme close up: the intimacy is startling and erotic as he begins to kiss her. Marnie's sexual subjugation terrifies her as much as the lightning. Clearly, within this segment her loss of control in the narrative is equally matched by the transfer of POV to Mark.
After Marnie and Mark leave the office, Hitchcock underscores their burgeoning intimacy, which is reinforced by their discussion of horses, by the use of their joint continuing POV as they drive and talk. Later, their "date" at the racetrack continues the progression of their relationship, and this is reflected in the POV strategy that Hitchcock adopts. The segment is carefully and symmetrically built, as if enfolding the newly formed couple both narratively and visually. The segment consists of three separate scenes: the first takes place at the track itself, the second in the paddock, and the third in the dining area. Each of these spaces is invaded by a stranger whose threat to expose Marnie is triggered by sight and results in bringing the couple closer together.
The racetrack segment begins with the continuing POV of a man (not a known character in the narrative) who recognizes Marnie as the woman who robbed him in a previous heist. His POV begins the segment as he scans the crowd, even lifting a rolled newspaper to his eye (with the appropriately masked B shot of Marnie and Mark following) to isolate his target visually; there is no doubt at whom he is looking. His POV is also the last of the segment: in fact, his discovered POV (in each case, of Marnie and Mark) ends each scene of the segment. (There is one additional shot at the very end of the segment: a three-shot in which Mark tells him to "get lost.") Meanwhile, Marnie and Mark also engage in POV activity: in each scene they exhibit their growing closeness and its tenuous state by sharing POV's. At the track and in the dining area, their shot-reverse shot POV episodes are egalitarian. In the paddock area, the most complex of the three scenes, Marnie and Mark, by means of multiple POV, in two-shot look together at the horse that interests them. Their shared POV splits into individual (really, multiple) closed POV's for each of them, however, when Marnie focuses on the red-on-white shirt the jockey wears --- with the accompanying suffusion of the screen with red upon returning to her in shot A. Mark's later closed POV of the same shirt, of course, reveals no such traumatic reaction. By sharing POV's, their growing closeness is thus amply demonstrated, but POV also reveals what separates them: Marnie's trauma. (Her psychological problems have caused her to close herself off from all emotional involvement but particularly from any sexual implication. Marnie's only positive emotional investment until the end of the film is with Forio, her horse.)
The organization of this segment is essential to our comprehension of its emotional components, and POV is the linchpin that holds it together. Marnie and Mark's shared POV's provide enlightening commentary on the state of their intimacy, yet the trauma that prevents her from sexually coupling with Mark is also revealed via POV. This revelation is centered in the segment's midpoint, nestled squarely in the second of the three scenes. The placement is important. The stranger's POV episodes elicit sympathy for Marnie because they quite literally surround her and seem to be pervasive. Structurally, then, Hitchcock uses a combination of another character's POV's and Marnie's own multiple POV's with Mark to deepen our comprehension of her predicament and to intensify her situation: the woman who had been in such professional control is thus made more vulnerable.
Marnie and Mark's relationship progresses through a trip to his family homestead and stolen kisses in the stable. Evidently feeling the sexual net tighten around her ever more constrictively, Marnie explodes in the only way she can: she robs the Rutland office. Following the compromises she has made with Mark, Marnie's autonomy in this segment is astonishing. She is the "star" of the show both narratively and subjectively: the camera either focalizes on her at surface level or looks through her eyes. Marnie's POV prevails and brackets the theft, encompassing her breaking into the safe and making her escape after the cleaning woman enters the scene. The naturally edgy quality to this segment is enhanced by this threat: though the cleaning woman is ignorantly blind and literally deaf to Marnie's activity, Marnie's POV helps maintain the tension because the viewer's knowledge exceeds hers. It is significant that Hitchcock introduces the threat itself in an objective shot (almost a "split screen" effect that is accomplished by framing), without showing the cleaning woman's POV: in this way, identification with Marnie is kept intact and the strength her character must exhibit is not diluted.
Thus far in the film Marnie's character has sustained the primary interest of the viewer because of the course the narrative has taken and because of Hitchcock's subjective style of filming. Marnie is made a sexual object by Mark and others and is manipulated by her mother; she is haunted by a mysterious past, out of control, threatened with exposure; we have witnessed her stealing and lying, seen how unbalanced her emotional life is. Yet, at this midway point in the film, she is the focus of our emotional investment, the character who has been subjectively exposed to the greatest degree. Hitchcock frequently uses this tactic of placing the viewer in a morally indefensible position by means of subjective filming (as when, for example, we watch with Norman Bates as the car with Marion Crane's body in the trunk sinks to the bottom of the swamp in Psycho), but rarely has this vantage point been maintained over a significant period of time and with such centrality to the narrative.
Mark, beginning with his introduction in the prologue, is a charismatic character who fascinates partially because his motives are ambiguous. Whereas Marnie's POV activity begins equivocally but quickly advances to the point where it is the most active of any character's and even becomes structurally significant, the route Mark's POV takes is more subtle. His first actual POV episodes occur as he watches Marnie when she applies for work. Although his objectives are not always clear, Mark moves from stealing glances at Marnie in the office to sharing POV's with her, eventually segueing into taking control of the POV device from her. In terms of both POV and narrative then, Mark's characterization builds slowly, reliably: he is patient and resourceful, with the attitude of willingly biding his time for what will most assuredly come to him. Marnie, in marked contrast, is the one who cannot wait, the bomb about to explode, the open wound in need of immediate care. Their POV trajectories match the characters themselves: the screen flushed with red clearly matches Marnie's agitation, while Mark's patient, analytic nature is demonstrated in the way his POV's build to significance.
When Mark discovers that the Rutland office has been burglarized it leads directly to Marnie, as he first confronts her, then blackmails her into marriage. Mark's motives are not made clear, but he certainly seems, as Hitchcock has claimed, obsessed with the woman because she is a thief. Though the marriage itself is not shown on-screen, the honeymoon is and in great detail. In this segment, Marnie's fear of sex is foregrounded but not significantly through her POV: Marnie has no individual POV's at all. Mark's POV dominates the entire segment and Marnie as well.
While the segment at the race track contains elements of Marnie's capitulation in the face of exposure and sexual threat, the honeymoon segment hinges, in terms of both POV and narrative, on Mark's unqualified preeminence: the male animal dominates the female. The segment obviously takes place over several days on board ship as Marnie and Mark come to terms with her frigidity. Mark's frequent continuing POV episodes objectify Marnie and delineate the trajectory of her rejection of and eventual submission to his sexual advances. (His interest in her as a biological specimen is alluded to at one point by the book over which he peers at her in his A shots: "Animals of the Seashore.") But Mark is much more than sexually hungry. His patience with and regard for this woman who so clearly rejects him are underscored narratively by Hitchcock: again and again Mark talks with Marnie, attempting to sublimate his desire into a "civilized" relationship she can tolerate. This tactic is mirrored in Hitchcock's use of POV. As in the racetrack segment, Marnie and Mark share shot-reverse shot episodes throughout in which Mark's equanimity toward her is emphasized. These shot-reverse shot episodes do not, however, balance the equation as they do in the previous segment. There, the threat of exposure that the stranger represents is offset by the protection Mark offers. Here, Mark's strength in supporting her is countered by the threat that he himself poses to Marnie's precarious mental balance.
Mark's rape of Marnie is likewise reflected in POV. Although Mark is patient with her and seems in control, Marnie's anxiety is high. In shot-reverse shot situations building up to the rape, camera distance favors Mark, making him the aggressor. Marnie even turns her back on Mark when they are engaged in reciprocal POV, effectively relinquishing her perspective to what becomes his continuing POV. As Mark physically approaches Marnie, shot-reverse shot prevails until Mark takes Marnie's nightgown off. At this point, although the editing signals shot-reverse shot, Marnie's staring eyes as she falls back onto the bed are ample evidence that this is Mark's continuing POV and no longer reciprocal at all. Even after Marnie's attempted suicide, Mark's perspective prevails as he searches for her. While the segment ends with the equivocal device of shot-reverse shot as Marnie discusses her destructive act, the entire scene of the rape is dominated by Mark narratively and in terms of perspective.
After Marnie and Mark return from their honeymoon, Marnie's vulnerability is pointedly displayed in additional revelations about the dream which tortured her at her mother's home. In the previous segment, the dream is sketched in outline form while the viewer remains outside Marnie's consciousness: the cord of a shade taps against the window pane and the camera moves to isolate Marnie as she dreams in bed, tossing and murmuring deliriously; the viewer is kept outside her interior processes except for the device of suffusing the screen with red when she is in close up. But, at this later point in the narrative, Hitchcock reveals Marnie's dream at a deeper level. Marnie is shown in the midst of a nightmare in a room that seems to be in her mother's house. A man's hand ominously taps in a repeated rhythm on the window. As the movement of the camera reveals these essentials about the dream, it places the viewer literally inside her head and able to see what she is dreaming. Of course, this is not a point of view shot because it is not happening within the "reality" of the narrative; rather, it is a form of internal focalization at the deepest level, revealing what is going on in Marnie's mind. This is made evident as the camera continues its movement past Marnie's childhood bedroom and into the bedroom of the Rutland home where Mark is knocking at the door. (It appears that the two sets were simply side-by-side for the filming of this shot.)
Mark's entry into the bedroom signals the beginning of his continuing POV of Marnie. Seeing Marnie through Mark's eyes assures the viewer that Marnie is really, after all, physically in the Rutland home. More than that, however, Mark's subsequent POV's in this segment (and that of Lil, whose jealousy sparks her "concern" over Marnie) have the specific purpose of helping to turn the narrative back towards the mystery of Marnie's trauma after it has taken a romantic detour. (Marnie is hardly capable of self-examination at this point.) Mark's questions move the story in this direction, too. When Mark presses Marnie for further details of her dream, they segue into a free association game that is supported by the device of shot-reverse shot, the first and only physical POV's Marnie is conceded in this segment. Shot-reverse shot ends when Marnie screams "White!" in response to Mark's "Red." Appropriately ending with Marnie crying for help from Mark, the segment gets deep inside Marnie's consciousness and uses other characters' POV's to help lay the narrative groundwork for the unraveling of the enigma.
The character Strutt, who accuses Marnie at the start of the film, threatens her with exposure when he attends a party at the Rutland home. Although Mark proves, once again, supportive, Marnie is understandably still shaken by the event during an arranged fox hunt the next day. The segment of the hunt is one of the pivotal segments in the film because, in the killing of her beloved horse Forio, Marnie reenacts the central event from the trauma of her childhood. Marnie's POV's naturally predominate the action, but her sister-in-law Lil also plays a significant role in the equation.
Marnie's POV occurrences begin when the frenzied actions of the hunting dogs provoke the laughter of the assembled party. As Marnie observes the scene (her continuing POV), she sees the back of a red riding jacket which fills the frame. On the return to shot A (Marnie in close up), the screen is suffused with red, and she rides out of frame in a panic. Marnie's POV's continue throughout her wild ride in a variety of configurations (closed, continuing, and usual POV's), amplifying the increasing danger of the jumps the horse is making. It is through Marnie's POV's that the viewer sees the fallen horse and, with her, fires the gun which ends his life. This last particular closed POV episode is a most effective way of ending the segment: when the camera cuts back to Marnie's face after she sees Forio's body absorb the impact of the bullet, Marnie softly murmurs "There, there now" as though comforting a small child.
Lil's POV episodes in this segment are not as numerous as Marnie's, nor as dramatic, but they provide a reaction to Marnie's actions and indicate the contrapuntal sensibility Lil brings to the drama. Lil watches Marnie ride off, follows her, and, seeing her obtain the gun, unsuccessfully attempts to interfere with the shooting of Forio. Lil has been a peripheral character in the drama, but her presence here is important. Marnie is almost somnambulistic as she approaches the horse to kill him, and another character's reactions are necessary to help the viewer absorb the enormity --- truly, the horror --- of this event to Marnie. Moreover, because Forio's killing may be read as analogous to the murder of the sailor in Marnie's childhood, the fact that Lil is a woman connects directly with the presence of Marnie's mother at the sailor's death.
Forio's death has a devastating effect on Marnie: she steals Mark's keys and proceeds to the Rutland office in an attempt to finish the robbery she almost, but for Mark's discovery of the missing money, carried off earlier. Marnie's individual POV's in this segment center on the office safe, but --- as with her POV's when, early in the film, she changes her identity --- they are not clearly defined. Her continuing POV as she reaches for the money is interrupted by objective shots that break the flow of subjectivity. These three objective shots show Marnie's hand as she reaches for the cash and detail the increasing difficulty she experiences in physically picking up the stacks of bills. Accompanying these impersonal shots that are incorporated into the POV figure are expressionist tactics which electrically charge her POV's: increasingly agitated camera movements during the B shots of the money signal her distress at not being able to complete the theft. The confusion which this creates --- mixing intense subjectivity with disturbing objectivity --- seems an appropriate cinematic expression of Marnie's suffering.
Whereas during the former attempted robbery Marnie was autonomous, this time Mark appears on the scene. His entrance occurs just as Marnie is experiencing the deepest throes of her uncertainty: his off-screen voice gently says to her, "I'll take you home, Marnie." Mark's obvious concern is reflected not only in his mannerisms and actions, but also in the profile that POV adopts. While POV emphasis definitely rests with Marnie in this segment, almost as much importance is accorded to Mark individually and to occurrences of multiple POV (where Marnie and Mark share vision). Once Mark is upon the scene, even though the two characters are struggling for control, the somewhat hysterical quality of POV settles into a calmer, more regular appearance: the confusion of objective and subjective shots and the use of expressionist tactics are replaced by clearly defined POV occurrences that exhibit comparative stability. Exemplary of this phenomenon is the last grouping of POV shots in the segment. Mark's closed POV of Marnie becomes shot-reverse shot when she raises her eyes to him and reciprocates his look. (Thus Marnie reverses the action she takes during the honeymoon segment at which time she turns her back on Mark during shot-reverse shot and relinquishes her vision to his POV.) The importance of Hitchcock's use of this particular combination of POV figures is connected to the trajectory of the narrative. When Marnie raises her eyes to him, Mark's visual possession of her (his closed POV) becomes an interchange, a communication (shot-reverse shot). These POV figures thus point the way towards Marnie's salvation and towards the denouement which follows.
The final segment of the film reveals the source of Marnie's trauma to be her murder of the sailor when she tries to save her mother from further injury. The uncovering of the truth of the incident is accomplished through a combination of Mark's confrontation of Marnie's mother and Marnie's own memories of the event. POV, of course, plays a pivotal role in structuring the final revelations and conclusion; in fact, because of the number of protagonists who are subjectively presented and the intricacy of their interactions, POV is at its most complex in this segment.
Mark and Mrs. Edgar attack Marnie from different sides, with Marnie's mother in denial about her daughter's violent act. This is visually represented by the POV figure of shot-reverse shot, the same device in which the two women are locked early in the film when Marnie first visits her mother's house. Mark and Mrs. Edgar also have individual POV's which are designed to strengthen this interpretation. Significantly, all individual POV occurrences for these two are POV's of Marnie. Furthermore, these POV's are sometimes juxtaposed expressly to heighten the sense of comparison. For example, Mark's POV of Marnie at her mother's knee is immediately followed by Mrs. Edgar's POV of Marnie's hair spread over her lap: "... you're achin'' my leg ...," she tells the daughter she cannot bear to love.
Marnie's most significant subjective moments in the film come during this segment with her flashback to the night of the murder. Although certainly not POV, deep level internal focalization provides an even more subjective understanding of the interior workings of Marnie's mind. Groundwork for Marnie's reliving of the memory has been laid earlier in the film, most memorably in her dream after the return from the honeymoon trip. When the flashback begins, Marnie looks off-screen. There is a cut to a sofa in her mother's living room, but this is not what she sees: the shot of the sofa dissolves into the first shot of the flashback. Although Marnie's flashback contains no shots which could be construed as being from her literal perspective, Hitchcock frequently interrupts the flashback with what would be interpreted as returns to shot A (of Marnie) in a continuing POV situation. These shots are invariably followed (before returning to the flashback) by a shot of either Mark or Marnie's mother, as though verifying their mutual comprehension of what is being revealed.
Marnie also has individual POV's, but quantitatively they are no more frequent than those of Mark or Mrs. Edgar. Like Mark and her mother, Marnie has a limited number of individual POV occurrences in this segment and they all focus on one character. In Marnie's case, that character is her mother. Marnie watches the progression of her mother's dissolution as she at first stands up to Mark and finally, after the truth has emerged, sits in her chair defeated and old. Poignantly, this is Marnie's final view of her mother and her last individual POV of the film.
While the device of shot-reverse shot is used in this segment, as mentioned above, to illustrate the contrary viewpoints of Mark and his mother-in-law, there is only one instance of true multiple POV (where two or more characters see the same thing). The last POV occurrence of the film takes place as Marnie and Mark leave the Edgar house and prepare to get into their car. The mystery has been solved, and the couple emerge into the sunshine after the literal and metaphoric storms have passed. In a close shot, Marnie pauses on the front steps and looks off-screen. The next shot reveals the object of her gaze to be little Jessie and her friends who are playing on the steps next door. Jessie turns to acknowledge the couple. The camera then cuts to Mark in close up, obviously looking at the children.
The form that Hitchcock has chosen to use in this instance is the conventional form for closed POV:
shot A = the glance off-screen
shot B = the object of the glance is revealed
return to shot A = for emphasis.
But Hitchcock has modified the form to his own purposes by the substitution of Mark for Marnie in the return to shot A. Marnie and Mark have frequently shared multiple POV's over the course of the film, but those POV episodes do not exhibit a marked change in structure nor are they so pointedly isolated. By making this episode the only instance of true multiple POV in the last segment, by pointedly placing it at the end of the film, and by structurally substituting Mark for Marnie, Hitchcock reinforces the concept of the newly-formed couple. By bracketing shots of Marnie and Mark around their view of the little girl who represents Marnie as a child, Hitchcock reinforces the idea of the couple as strong and able to prevail. However dubious Marnie and Mark's future may logically appear in this final moment of the film, Hitchcock's manipulation of the POV figure assures of a happy ending. By joining with Mark to form the heterosexual couple, Marnie will no longer be alone, and whatever she has relinquished surely will not be missed.