w/Ivor Novello, June, Marie Ault, Arthur Chesney, Malcolm Keen,
Eve Gray, Maudie Dunham, Daisy Campbell
The third film directed by Alfred Hitchcock deals in a masterful
way with the effect of crime on ordinary people. The suspenseful
story concerns a lodger (Novello) who befriends Daisy (June), the
daughter of the folks he's rooming with. Daisy's fiancé, who
is a detective, becomes so jealous he thinks the lodger is the
mysterious strangler of women who's currently terrorizing London.
"FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT. The Lodger, I believe,
was your first important film venture.
"ALFRED HITCHCOCK. That's another story. The
Lodger was the first true 'Hitchcock movie.' I had seen a play
called Who Is He?, based on Mrs. Belloc Lowndes's novel
The Lodger. The action was set in a house that took in
roomers and the landlady wondered whether her new boarder was Jack
the Ripper or not. I treated it very simply, purely from her point
of view. Since then there have been two or three remakes, but they
are too elaborate.
"F.T. In actual fact, the hero was innocent. He was not
Jack the Ripper.
"A.H. That was the difficulty. Ivor Novello, the leading
man, was a matinee idol in England. He was a very big name at the
time. These are the problems we face with the star system. Very
often the story line is jeopardized because a star cannot be a
villain.
"F.T. I gather that you would have preferred the hero to
turn out to be Jack the Ripper?
"A.H. Not necessarily. But in a story of this kind I
might have liked him to go off in the night, so that we would
never really know for sure. But with the hero played by a big
star, one can't do that. You have to clearly spell it out in big
letters: 'He is innocent.'
"F.T. You know, I am rather surprised that you would
consider an ending that failed to provide the public with the
answer to its question.
"A.H. In this case, if your suspense revolves around the
question: 'Is he or is he not Jack the Ripper?' and your reply,
'Yes, he is Jack the Ripper,' you've merely confirmed a
suspicion. To me, this is not dramatic. But here, we went in the
other direction and showed that he wasn't Jack the Ripper at
all.
"I ran into the same problem sixteen years later when I made
Suspicion with Cary
Grant. Cary Grant could not be a murderer.
"F.T. Would he have refused?
"A.H. No, not necessarily. But the producers would
surely have refused. The Lodger is the first picture
possibly influenced by my period in Germany. The whole approach to
this film was instinctive with me. It was the first time I
exercised my style. In truth, you might almost say that The
Lodger was my first picture.
"F.T. A very good movie which showed great visual
inventiveness. I really enjoyed it.
"A.H. As a matter of fact, I took a pure narrative and,
for the first time, presented ideas in purely visual terms. We
took fifteen minutes of a winter afternoon in London, starting
about five-twenty. We opened with the head of a blond girl who is
screaming. I remember the way I photographed it. I took a sheet of
glass, placed the girl's head on the glass and spread her hair
around until it filled the frame. Then we lit the glass from
behind so that one would be struck by her light hair. Then we cut
to show an electric sign advertising a musical play, Tonight,
Golden Curls, with the reflection flickering in the water. The
girl has drowned. She's hauled out of the water and pulled ashore.
The consternation of the bystanders suggests that a murder has
been committed. The police arrive on the scene, then the press.
The camera follows one of the newsmen as he moves toward a
telephone. He isn't a local reporter, but a wire-service man who
is calling his office. And now I proceed to show everything that
happens as the new spreads around.
"First, the item is typed out on the wire-service machine so
that we are able to read a few sentences. Then it is forwarded on
the teletypes. People in clubs learn the news. Then there is a
radio announcement, with people tuned in to the broadcast.
Finally, it is flashed on an electric news sign --- you know, like
on Times Square. And each time, we give additional information, so
that you learn more about the crime. The man murders only women.
Always blonds. He invariably strikes on a Tuesday. How many he has
killed to date. Speculation on his motives. He goes around dressed
in a black cloak and carries a black bag. What is in that bag?
"Through all the different means of communication, the
information begins to spread, and finally, the evening papers are
out on the street. Now we show the effect on various people.
Fair-haired girls are terrified. The brunettes are laughing.
Reactions in the beauty parlors or of people on their way home.
Some blonds steal dark curls and put them under their hats.
"Lend me your pen a moment. I want to show you a shot, though
we were never able to get it right. I showed the back of a small
London news van. The back windows are oval. There were two men
sitting in the front, the driver and his mate. You see them
through the windows --- just the tops of their heads. And as the
van sways from side to side, you have the impression of a face
with two eyes and the eyeballs are moving. Unfortunately, it
didn't work out.
"Now, we follow one girl home. There is her family and her
boyfriend, a detective from Scotland Yard, and they are kidding
him: 'Why aren't you arresting Jack the Ripper?' They go on for a
while, teasing and laughing. And then the atmosphere changes
because the lights become dimmer. And mother suddenly turns to her
husband. 'The gas is going down. Put a shilling in the meter, will
you, please?' Now it is dark everywhere. Just then there is a
knock at the door. Mother goes to open it. Here a quick
crosscutting to the shilling being dropped into the meter. Back to
mother opening the door and then the lights go up. There is a man
in a black cloak, pointing to the sign that says 'Rooms to
Let.'
"So I didn't bring the leading man on until fifteen minutes
after the beginning of the film. They show him to his room. Now,
father falls off his chair with a loud crash. The new lodger is
unnerved by the noise and this makes him appear suspicious to the
others. In his room the man paces up and down. You must remember
that we had no sound in those days, so I had a plate-glass floor
made through which you could see the lodger moving back and forth,
causing the chandelier in the room below to move with him.
"Naturally, many of these visual devices would be absolutely
superfluous today because we would use sound effects instead. The
sound of the steps and so on.
"F.T. In any case, in your recent movies, there are far
fewer special effects. Nowadays you use an effect only when it's
necessary to generate emotion, whereas in the past you seemed to
put them in just for the fun of it. I don't imagine you would show
someone through a glass floor now.
"A.H. That's the change of style. Today I would simply
use the swaying chandelier.
"F.T. I mention this because some people claim that your
movies contain a great many gratuitous effects. I believe, on the
contrary, that your camerawork is becoming almost invisible. In
many pictures the director attempts to provide the Hitchcock touch
by placing the camera in an unlikely spot. I have in mind, for
example, Lee-Thompson, a British director. In one of his so-called
Hitchcockian pictures the star goes to fetch something from the
refrigerator, and oddly enough, the camera is located
inside the refrigerator, in the rear. Would you have done
it that way?
"A.H. Certainly not. That's like shooting through the
fireplace, behind the flames.
"F.T. The finale of The Lodger , when the hero is
handcuffed, suggests a lynching.
"A.H. Yes. When he tried to climb over the railings.
Psychologically, of course, the idea of the handcuffs has deeper
implications. Being tied to something ... it's somewhere in the
area of fetishism, isn't it?
"F.T. I don't know, but I have noticed that handcuffs
have a way of recurring in your movies.
"A.H. Well, look at the way the newspapers like to show
people being taken to jail in handcuffs.
"F.T. True. In fact, sometimes they even circle the
handcuffs with a white line.
"A.H. I remember one time when they showed the head of
the New York Stock Exchange being jailed. He was handcuffed to a
Negro. Later on I used that in The
Thirty-nine Steps.
"F.T. Yes, a man and a woman linked to each other.
Handcuffs are certainly the most concrete --- the most immediate
--- symbol of the loss of freedom.
"A.H. There's also a sexual connotation, I think. When I
visited the vice museum in Paris, I noticed there was considerable
evidence of sexual aberrations through restraint. You should try
to go there sometime. Of course, they also have knives, the
guillotine, and all sorts of information. Anyway, getting back to
the handcuffs in The Lodger, I think the idea was inspired,
to a certain extent, by a German book about a man who spends a
whole day in handcuffs and tells about all the problems he runs
into during that day.
"F.T. Would that be From Nine to Nine by Leon
Perutz? I believe [director F.W.] Murnau was interested in
doing a screen version of it around 1927.
"A.H. It might be that one.
"F.T. Is it farfetched to suggest that in the scene
where the man in handcuffs is backed up against the railing, you
were trying to evoke the figure of Christ?
"A.H. When the people try to lift him and his arms are
tied together? Naturally, that thought did occur to me.
"F.T. All of this adds up to the fact that The
Lodger was really the first Hitchcockian picture, primarily
through the theme that recurs in almost all of your later works: a
man accused of a crime of which he's innocent.
"A.H. That's because the theme of the innocent man being
accused, I feel, provides the audience with a greater sense of
danger. It's easier for them to identify with him than with a
guilty man on the run. I always take the audience into
account.
"F.T. In other words, it's a theme that satisfies the
audience's fascination with the clandestine, while also allowing
it to identify with the character. Most of your works are about an
ordinary man who is involved in an out-of-the-ordinary
situation.
"Wasn't it in The Lodger that you made your first
personal appearance on the screen?
"A.H. That's right. I was sitting in a newsroom. ...
"F.T. Did you do it as a gag? Was it superstition? Or
was it simply that there weren't enough extras?
"A.H. It was strictly utilitarian; we had to fill the
screen. Later on it became a superstition and eventually a gag,
and I'm very careful to show up in the first five minutes so as to
let the people look at the rest of the movie with no further
distraction.
"F.T. I understand The Lodger was a great
hit.
"A.H. It was first shown to the staff of the
distribution company and the head of their publicity department.
They saw the film and then made their report to the boss:
'Impossible to show. Too bad. The film is terrible.' Two days
later the big boss came down to the studio to look at it. He
arrived at two-thirty. Mrs. Hitchcock and I couldn't bear to wait
in the studio to know the results and we walked the streets of
London for an hour and a half. Finally, we took a cab and went
back. We were hoping our promenade would have a happy ending and
that everyone in the studio would be beaming. What they said was:
'The boss says it's terrible.' And they put the film on the shelf,
canceled the bookings that had been made on the basis of Novello's
reputation. A few months later they decided to take another look
at the picture and to make some changes. I agreed to make about
two. As soon as the picture was shown, it was acclaimed as the
greatest British film made up to that date.
"F.T. Do you remember what the distributors' objections
were?
"A.H. I can't remember. I suspect that the director who
had me fired as his assistant was still being 'political' against
me. I know he told someone, 'I don't know what he's shooting. I
can't make head nor tail of it.'"
Notes for lecture on the film:
THE LODGER: Hitchcock
called it: 1st true Hitchcock film: 1st that truly
engaged him:
when LODGER
filmed: Alfred & Alma were in love:
their
wedding: December 1926: after release of LODGER:
LODGER:
cemented their personal love story
LODGER: based on
Marie Belloc Lowndes' 1913 novel: very
successful
1916:
turned into play: big hit; Hitchcock: fan of both:
but
film makes significant departures from both novel & play:
example:
book: wide assortment of victims:
film:
victims: all curly-haired blonde women:
1st known instance of blonde fixation in Hitchcock film:
totally
invented by him
Eliot
Stannard: worked with Hitchcock: credited with scenario for:
Hitchcock's
1st film: THE PLEASURE GARDEN:
from
LODGER on: worked on every silent Hitchcock film
script
for LODGER: credited to Stannard: really written by 3 people:
Stannard,
Hitchcock, Alma Reville:
Alma:
considered most important contributor
story of a
series of murders that take place in London:
blonde
“girls”: young women: on Tuesday nights: in same area of London
paper
with triangle drawn on it with “The Avenger” written inside
start of film:
mini-doc: imagine yourself: time when newspapers only media:
how
crime is reported / reactions: from likely victims
then:
1 family: Daisy & her parents
in LODGER: 1st appearance of many themes: Hitchcock returned to over & over again:
mistaken
identity: wrong man
blonde
woman: major component of Hitchcock films:
LODGER:
Daisy: played by June
staircases:
never merely staircases in Hitchcock films:
LODGER:
birds eye shot of hand on railing descending:
becomes
act full of menace
NOTORIOUS:
last scene: staircase:
full
of suspense, drama, romantic meaning, complexities
cameo:
back to camera: seated at desk in newsroom: talking on phone:
telling
cameo: 1st one: in newspaper office: saying:
he's
part of world, too: part of telling stories
big
set piece: climax: classic Hitchcock:
goes
from closed, claustrophobic story: to pub:
out
to streets: mob chasing lodger
also:
handcuffs
stairways
religious
symbolism: crucifixion / Pieta
influence of expressionism:
geometric design to titles // shadows // angles
Hitchcock:
fortunate to work on 1st 2 films as director in German studios:
during
height of German expressionism:
watched
Murnau filming LAST LAUGH: greatly influenced LODGER:
LODGER:
looks like German expressionist film: lighting, camera angles
gliding, moving camera: like Murnau's
using
film to show psychological states, subjective POV:
will
become hallmark of AH films
plate
glass floor shot: expressionist technique: expressing state of mind
Hitchcock: also influenced
by Russians: quick cuts for shock effect
when LODGER
completed: at studio: 2 main enemies of film:
1. C.M. Woolf: controlled distribution
2. Graham Cutts: Hitchcock had been asst.
director on 2 films:
WOMAN
TO WOMAN / WHITE SHADOW
Woolf:
blamed Hitchcock for "WHITE SHADOW incident":
film:
expected to bring in lots of $:
Hitchcock:
asst. director, scenic director, co-scenarist:
when
released: complete disaster
Woolf:
blamed Hitchcock for "artistic touches":
saw
same thing happening when LODGER being filmed:
expected
another flop for studio
Cutts
& Woolf together: both had interest in Gainsborough:
tried
to block release of LODGER:
could
have stopped AH's career as director
Balcon:
brought in Ivor Montagu: ran film society:
greatly
influenced by Soviet filmmakers:
credit:
"Editing and Titling .........Ivor Montagu":
made
some editing changes: particularly: climax: chase sequence
when
film released: became huge hit: sealed Hitchcock as 1 of greatest directors
post-screening:
design of opening credits
unusual: Hitchcock recruited US artist:
E.
McKnight Cawper: to design credits & title cards:
helped
revolutionize British poster art
credits
typeface: reinforces German aesthetic
Hitchcock,
Cawper & Montagu: all members of British Film Society:
German
films: frequently on program
Hitchcock: also drawn to editing
techniques of Russians:
2
primary influences on young Hitchcock: Germans & Russians:
hard
to say which more important to his work
Russian & German
influences: work together in
LODGER:
used
to set mood & orient audience to story information
1st image: woman
screaming: blonde woman: golden curls:
no
single image more emblematic of Hitchcock film:
2
other AH films start this way: MURDER! / TO CATCH A THIEF:
also:
Janet Leigh: PSYCHO / Tippi Hedren: BIRDS:
opening: 1st:
sketching in character types in crowd: humble Cockney lower-class types:
like
people he observed as boy: voyeurism
Hitchcock
specialty: behind-the-scenes procedural overtures:
big
fan of newspapers: gives us journey of news story:
from
scene of crime to newsboys on streets shouting headlines:
background
detail: fascinated audiences of 1920s: new technology
technique:
brings us up-to-date with case without lots of intertitles
character of
avenger: stand-in for Jack the Ripper:
Hitchcock:
grew up in Leytonstone: near Whitechapel: beginning in 1888:
where
Ripper killed women: stabbed & mutilated them
character
of Avenger: 1st MacGuffin
newsboys calling
out headlines: disappears from Hitchcock's US films:
but
comes back when setting is England:
FOREIGN
CORRESPONDENT / FRENZY
AH:
spent large part of his career pursuing Jack the Ripper:
LODGER
to SHADOW OF A DOUBT to PSYCHO to FRENZY:
he
never forgot Jack the Ripper
another characteristic
Hitchcock scene:
chorus
girls backstage: in progressive stages of undress:
voyeuristic
director turns his audience into voyeurs
complex
staging & composition: titillating male members of audience:
reminds
us of golden curls & Avenger: we're both titillated & frightened:
"the
enjoyment of fear"
Hitchcock:
loved going backstage: often:
leading
ladies: actresses, chorus girls, fashion models
fascinated
by their glamour: but also by reality behind their mask:
Wyman
& Dietrich: STAGE FRIGHT
Kelly:
REAR WINDOW
scene: landlord,
landlady, Joe: dialog: reminds us of what's happening with Avenger:
cops:
let him get away: bumbling cops: in Hitchcock films:
Hitchcock:
did not believe in law enforcement or courts or capital punishment:
Hitchcock:
lets us know right away: Joe isn't too bright
also:
meticulous re: setting of home: right for class of characters
"cookie
cutter moment": Joe & heart:
visualizes
content & emotion of scene: without using intertitles
lodger arrives:
Ivor Novello: helped set mold for Hitchcock men:
Hitchcock's
1st chance to exploit star popularity & subvert audience
expectation:
Novello:
1st dashing Hitchcock killer: big legion of female fans:
success
of film depended on them: but Novello was gay
Bunting
home: spooky house: also: #17 / REBECCA / PSYCHO
various
levels all connected by stairway
lodger:
prototype of recurring Hitchcock figure:
Olivier
in REBECCA
Grant
in SUSPICION
Cotten
in SHADOW OF A DOUBT
Todd
in STAGE FRIGHT
Perkins
in PSYCHO
all
“lodger-figures": existing in a state of suspense:
affects
our knowledge of them:
all:
do not know own nature
glass ceiling: plate
glass floor shot: camera pointed up, swaying of lamp, etc:
we
can almost hear footsteps: silent film: visuals replace sound
expressionist
technique: expressing state of mind
Daisy &
lodger: 1st scene together: breakfast: Hitchcock: many scenes around
eating meals:
Hitchcock:
focuses on knife in lodger's hand: teasing audience:
only
hint of danger & sexual tension
days later:
Daisy & lodger: playing chess: scene with poker: crosscutting: downstairs:
Hitchcock:
teasing us with suspicion re: Lodger
Joe: handcuffs
Daisy: joke gone sour: also alludes to sexual fetishism:
handcuffs:
also figure in film's climax:
also
in Hitchcock: objects/signs: introduced in opening scenes:
come
into play at end: circle back
Tuesday night:
complex sequence: intercutting:
police
/ London streets / suspicious landlady / lodger:
lighting
effects: expressionistic
AH:
crowd scenes: often: dark figures in foreground:
obstacles
block view: legs, hats, etc.: audience involvement stimulated
next morning:
news of Avenger's latest victim: Joe: as clumsy a lover as he is a cop
fashion parade:
lodger: bewitched by Daisy:
VERTIGO:
same kind of fashion parade: Scotty buys clothes for Judy
police
procedural scene: necessary for story:
common
in Hitchcock's silent films: disappears after that
later
films: Hitchcock more interested in wrong man or villain:
than
in misguided efforts of law enforcement
skepticism
re: police: gives modern aspect to films:
Hitchcock:
departs only 1 time: FRENZY:
penultimate
statement re: psycho killers
FRENZY:
theories of police: all wrong:
they
arrest & convict wrong man:
but
then: something remarkable in Hitchcock's universe:
inspector:
decides he may have made mistake:
decides
to continue investigation:
leads
to satisfying conclusion:
Hitchcock's
final & deepest commentary on police
Daisy: bathtub /
lodger: upstairs: brooding: goes downstairs:
1920s:
lodger couldn't go into bathroom:
later:
1960: PSYCHO: stranger goes into bathroom
tender
encounter between Daisy & lodger: bathroom door between them
Daisy: as Hitchcock
heroine: she's plucky survivor: like other of his women:
THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH:
1934: Jill: shoots better than police
FOREIGN
CORRESPONDENT & LIFEBOAT:
women
can tough it out in lifeboat in ocean
BIRDS:
Melanie: battles army of birds:
Daisy:
stands firmly in that tradition:
defending
lodger vs. Joe & police & mom & dad
Daisy’s
predicament: characteristic of Hitchcock’s dramas:
about
girl growing up into a woman:
appearance
(as if by magic) of a mysterious man:
man
may either:
1.
have power to make girl’s romantic dreams come true -or-
2.
be a monster:
REBECCA / SUSPICION / MARNIE
Hitchcock & leading
ladies: he poured himself into them:
advising
on hair & makeup, dictating their wardrobes:
even:
sometimes: giving them precise line readings:
but:
always strived for natural, unaffected quality
Daisy:
subjective character thru whose point of view:
we
increasingly view lodger:
character
without suspicion:
80
+ years later: June Tripp's performance holds up
street scenes:
filmed on actual locations:
fans
gathered: no problems: silent film
arrest of
lodger: Joe: realizes he's made mistake:
mixing
personal vengeance with duty
lodger's
backstory: done using flashbacks: he's
cleansed of any blame:
Hitchcock:
satisfying front office & Novello's fans
Ivor
Novello: big star: couldn't be killer: way novel ends:
way
Hitchcock handles him: raises suspicion
same
situation: Cary Grant: SUSPICION
but:
once we know backstory:
we
know for sure he's not Avenger: some of suspense gone
public chase:
aroused mob pursuing lodger thru street of London:
saved
in nick of time by Joe:
quick
cuts: montage:
sequence
most heavily influenced by Russians
Christian
/ Catholic symbolism:
crucifixion
of lodger:
Hitchcock's
Catholicism
film's coda: Hitchcock:
detested sugary happy endings:
39
STEPS: ending filmed with Donat & Carroll married: discarded:
end
in final film: dying man, chorus girls:
their
hands reach & come together: handcuffs dangling
REAR
WINDOW: happily ever after thwarted:
Kelly:
reading fashion magazine behind book on Himalayas
LODGER:
genuine happy ending for film: re-edited version approved for release:
September
1926: opened to critical & box office raves
with
LODGER: Hitchcock had arrived full-blown:
artist
with competent understanding of public
end:
lodger & Daisy: embrace & kiss: typical happy ending:
but:
in background winking at us: "golden curls":
reminding
us: perhaps real Avenger still loose
shot
ends with beautiful moving camera shot: "à la Murnau":
F.W. Murnau:
1 of Hitchcock's cinematic gods
curly blonde
heroine, blundering police, wrong man theme, triangular love story:
became
blueprint for much of rest of AH's career:
all
this in LODGER: part of film's legacy
triangles in
story: love triangle / family triangle /
triangle:
lodger, Joe & Avenger
also
triangles: credits / intertitles
after Hitchcock arrived
in US: tried to drum up support for remake of LODGER:
wanted
to stick to novel: especially ending: Selznick: wouldn't bite:
eventually:
1944: LODGER: remade by Universal:
tried
to be faithful to novel: strong film:
but
lacks edgy style & gripping power of Hitchcock's film
LODGER: model
for self-conscious Hitchcock narrative:
acknowledges
its own indirectness: withholding info:
not
a conventional detective story: clues not part of it: non-deductive:
only
clues given prove how well Hitchcock can keep a secret
compels
us to recognize film’s power:
showing
us what we both dread and desire to view
power
to acknowledge that lodger’s state of suspense is like our own:
provokes
us to acknowledge that our natures - like the lodger’s -
may
be monstrous
Joe: original of
a Hitchcock type: like Frank in BLACKMAIL:
police
detective: unconscious of his violent nature:
desire
for vengeance
abuses
official power - breaks with discipline of calling
fundamental
Hitchcock paradigm:
innocent
figure:
freed
for romantic union by damnation of guilty double who can’t marry
“wrong
one”: condemned from childhood to life of isolation:
sacrificed
so innocent double can marry
PSYCHO
connection:
Daisy
in bathtub: door in b/g:
same
set up as shower scene in PSYCHO
Daisy’s
vulnerability: someone could come thru door
lodger
under mother’s control:
as
in PSYCHO: she’s kept alive thru son
Lodger
in bed at end:
doctor’s
pronouncement: end of PSYCHO