Comments

And now for something completely different — 17 Comments

1. I loved the series (in reruns)…

   the opening showing the “strip” is cool compared to today… and of course the constant symbolism and cultural things that pretty much everyone would miss but back then added a bit to it without you noticing it.

   the point begs for an example…

   well, each character is brought in one at a time with you only getting to see the first one alone. McQueen entry is in terms of her, and Lorre came in on both of them.

   so what was the cultural nuance that would more than likely be missed today?

   The lighting of the cigarettes, again, follows the same pattern as the entry. first her, then he, and then Lorre who enters. (kind of like two verses of row row row your boat overlapping).

   Since Hitchcock is a master at this compared to the rest, he also threw in a message to the audience:
   Three on a match

   Three with one light is bad luck.

   Three on a match (also known as third on a match) is a supposed superstition among soldiers during the Crimean War to World War I. The superstition goes that if three soldiers lit their cigarettes from the same match, one of the three would be killed or that the man who was third on the match would be shot. Since then it has been considered bad luck for three people to share a light from the same match.

   HOWEVER, not so fast…

   The superstition was alleged to have been invented about a decade later by the Swedish match tycoon Ivar Kreuger in an attempt to get people to use more matches but it appears he merely made very shrewd use of the already existing belief which may date to the Boer War. In the 1916 novel The Wonderful Year the following explanation is given: “It arises out of the Russian funeral ritual in which the three altar candles are lit by the same taper. To apply the same method of illumination to three worldly things like cigars or cigarettes is regarded as an act of impiety and hence as unlucky.“

   now one may think that strange, but the Chinese have such customs as well. in America, a person eating rice without knowledge of this, might decide that its OK to just jam their chopsticks into the rice, and there the chopsticks stand, upright.

   The problem is that in Buddhism you light incense for loved ones (much like lighting a candle in the catholic church). without getting into it more, suffice it to say that when your done with what you do, you then place the incense in bowls with sand in them.

   And like the taper thing, jamming your chopsticks into the rice that way is a no no. (however they wont mention it to you as embarrassing you by telling would be a no no).

   suffice it to say that there are quite a number of such things. Which is why the number 3 is bad luck in Chinese, and 8 is lucky.

   now before you say i am crazy as to things, the practice of three on a match was not just done by Hitchcock. And its interesting to note that the wiki is missing his use. 🙂

   The three on a match is a foreshadowing of what will come and who is bringing the bad luck into it.

   Its a shame that sociopathic sexual sadism has replaced horror as horror. Any one want to bet that the movie that Holmes saw BEFORE Batman that really juiced his slide out the side door of reality was Jigsaw and SAW?

   But thats just it, like music, making such a film at its core is a primitivisation of such. oh, whats around it and how its done is extremely well done within the limitations of doing that. but content wise its simpler, with the question being more of what extreme thing can be made up and stitched into reality in some believable form, with shock replacing subtle horror.

   “We have been able to show how the global loudness level of music recordings has consistently increased over the years,” study author Joan Serra of the Spanish National Research Council said in an email exchange.

   Similarly, the team found the diversity of chords and melodies has “consistently diminished in the last 50 years”.

   The “primitivization” of Nietzsche and Heidegger
   the “forced retardation” of Adorno
   the “culture of barbarism” sought by Lukacs
   (as one internet author put it)

   but i mentioned this before in march, but given Hitchcock, horror, recent events, and culture… maybe its more apropos now.
   neoneocon.com/2012/03/13/wheres-the-beef

   “When the real world changes into simple images, simple images become real beings and effective motivations of a hypnotic behavior.

   The spectacle as a tendency to make one see the world by means of various specialized mediations (it can no longer be grasped directly), naturally finds vision to be the privileged human sense which the sense of touch was for other epochs; the most abstract, the most mystifiable sense corresponds to the generalized abstraction of present day society,” Guy Debord

   “…counterfeit life requires a pseudo-justification” — Debord

   Though i guess i should close with some more titbits of Hitchcock

   While making those six films, he hosted an informal film club that met almost nightly to discuss movies in general and to brainstorm ideas for his current projects. That guest list comprised an unmistakably politically active group of socialists, Communists and anti-fascists and their ideas made it into scene after scene of his finished movies. (During those years in England it was possible to be promote Communism with patriotic fervor.)

   a lot more interesting stuff here
   Private Politics and Public Propaganda
   http://www.alfredhitchcockgeek.com/2010/04/alfred-hitchcock-private-politics-and.html

   Is it any wonder that his art, and politics helped inch us closer towards a lower something? whether we enjoyed the ride is not the point, its where the ride takes us that is.

2. Who could forget THAT episode?

3. I remember that episode very well.

   I love my Zippo, which I’ve owned since the early 1980s, but I would never take that bet.

4. At the end is it a love story? Why did this woman stay with Carlos (Peter Lorre)? Why did she sacrifice all those fingers? She could have divorced him and left him in the insane asylum while she went to Las Vegas by herself. If its not love what is it?

5. Remembering that episode, in idle moments I’ll try to light it ten times in a row. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.

6. I just tried it and it failed on the second try.

7. Got six in a row that time.

8. Nope, not taking that bet.

9. I’ve always been a huge Twilight Zone fan, and I loved Rod Serling’s introductions and commentary on his shows.

   But Alfred Hitchcock’s introductions and wrap-ups were often hilarious. He had a very droll, deadpan sense of humor.

10. Artfldgr sees what the rest of us miss, and has the contextual resources with which to flesh out his observations. You are a treasure, Art.

11. Alfred Hitchcock, the master of suspense, delivered the Commencement Address at my college where he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters. This was shortly after his movie The Birds was released. His message was the importance of humor in one’s life. He had done his research and had many very humorous references to the college’s courses (how the college managed to have a requirement for a Theology 110 course on The Sacrament of Matrimony before going co-educational) and a play that had been recently staged (“Bye-Bye Birdie”). A few excerpts:

    I do hope the university will make it clear at once that this degree was not conferred merely to enhance my television program. You see, people are likely to misunderstand, since the surest way of achieving a large audience in television is to have a doctor on your show. However, I doubt if these robes can ever be used as surgical gowns. For one thing, the color is not likely to inspire confidence. (He was dressed in the scarlet red robe of the regents.)
    It is also open to question as to whether a Doctor of Letters, humane or otherwise, would ever say, “The Birds Is Coming.” …
    I labor in a business and among people who can be very serious about what they’re doing. I might say that the genre of stories I deal with is deadly serious. For me, the only way to treat these stories is with humor. Without this approach, a story like Psycho would be a documentary, only so harsh as to be almost unbearable.
    I also like to keep a sense of humor while working. One should approach my type of work with a kind of hand-rubbing glee. A kind of pleasure as I contemplate whether it would be best to have the detective fall down the elevator shaft or backward out the window.
    All of you will not be fortunate enough to spend your lives committing murder, on film or otherwise, but I hope that you can keep your work well flavored with the saving salt of humor. …
    Every job you will hold and every task that will be assigned to you will be important, I know. Many will seem to be matters of life and death. I hope you will remember that Tragedy and Comedy are but two sides of the same coin. If you can step back from your work, you may not only catch sight of some amusing irony, but you may be able to return to the task with some fresh insight as well. …
    As for this honor which has been conferred upon me: I hope you will accept the sincere thanks of a grateful if somewhat tardy student. This means a great deal to me. So, when you next see my image flickering on your television screen, if I loom a bit larger, it will not mean that I have gained weight—blame it instead on the righteous puff of pride.

12. rickl, you forgot. the lighter then that was king wasnt Zippo, but Ronson…

    here is an old ronson ad.
    Notice that Ronson is a lighter, and the man is lighting the cigarettes of TWO women. with the advertising line.

    “Ronson is GOOD luck”

    http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_L8BTRutV0uk/SXyArjc7v7I/AAAAAAAAJ7A/Itnouw0QqPY/s400/Ronson+Lighter++Ad+1950.jpg

    Given we watch these movies many many years after they are created, we lose what was also part of the experience besides the timeless art (though i would question if what we see today is art. it was the ability to push limits within limits that makes great art. when your technically allowed to do anything, you just get randomness. unemotional, un-offending shapes of which you select the best by aesthetic appeal or notoriety and payola of the artist (see the series by Kostabi on how to be a great artist))

    but the key ad that EVERYONE knew at that time because of WWII was :
    “lights first time, every time.”

    why did everyone know it?

    The high velocity German guns that could easily penetrate the Sherman’s armor, coupled with vulnerable ammunition storage, gave the Sherman the nickname “Ronson,” taken from the Ronson cigarette lighter. This was based on the Ronson Company’s famous slogan, “lights first time, every time.”

    So hitchcock was playing with LOTS of ideas that come from culture, and THAT’s what makes his work so great, and why todays work is so empty vaccuous, and tends towards nihilistic remakes with only those with socialist themes running through them and politically correct characters.

    and as i said, real art comes from exceeding the limits within limitations, which is why the unlimited murder and death of SAW and that is not seen as art, but Matrix and Avatar.

    you see… since they cant deviate much from party line story line… they copy old socialist story lines from the greats of the past, and then make them seem like great art by exceeding in tricks and special effects, rather than deep content.

    or as CS Lewis makes clear in the Screwtape letters, don’t make them think don’t exercise that muscle. given time and leisure and deep thoughts to think, they will turn towards the spiritual, and they will thing of more important things. and handle larger more complicated less isolated views of stuff. they might realize that whats important is themselves and not stranger they never met that they are told by strangers they never met to care for more than themselves. they might think in terms of higher levels and outcomes and merit and may even have time to go do some research and find out who is lying.

    but this is why our movies don’t really fulfill us any more than the chocolates of the ice queen fulfilled the young prince (lion witch and the wardrobe – Narnia).

    in fact. we forget that as humans SYMBOLOGY is VERY important to us. the reason is clear as it was the language before language.

    that the minds capacity to think thoughts exceeds its capacity to transmit them, it stands to reason that language lags behind thinking (And that Chomsky is wrong on some of that).

    but since our days of grunts that even we understand from animals… the mind has done nothing but try to create a symbolic model of the world internally. (its the only mind model that explains with ease the full spectrum of medical conditions).

    We are SO keen on using symbols that we forget our symbols are not real. in the real world, there ARE no symbols (though there ARE signs – causational trails).

    and that is the whole point of this mental game their playing. to blurr the lines between reality that is external (from god), neutral, and completely principled without exception.
    [edited for length by n-n]

13. as i said… they copy from reality which can be more horrible, and even more twisted.

    hows this for twisted.
    sure makes one think about Our Leader, eh?

    Russian Spy Ring Aimed to Make Children Agents
    http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444097904577537044185191340.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsThird

    The effort to bring children into the family business suggests the ring was thinking long term: Children born or reared in America were potentially more valuable espionage assets than their parents because when they grew up they would be more likely to pass a U.S. government background check.

    -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

    His parents revealed their double life to him well before their arrest, according to current and former officials, whose knowledge of the discussion was based on surveillance by the Federal Bureau of Investigation that included bugging suspects’ homes. The officials said the parents also told their son they wanted him to follow in their footsteps.

    He agreed, said the officials. At the end of the discussion with his parents, according to one person familiar with the surveillance, the young man stood up and saluted “Mother Russia.” He also agreed to travel to Russia to begin formal espionage training, officials said.

    -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

    U.S. officials say one of them, Richard Murphy–whose real name was Vladimir Guryev–worked for several years as the in-house computer technician at a U.S. consultancy called the G7 Group, which advised clients on how government decisions might affect global markets. The firm’s experts included its chief executive, Jane Hartley, an active Democratic fundraiser, and Alan Blinder, a former Federal Reserve vice chairman.

14. If you like this episode, try “The Glass Eye”, also on Youtube.

15. I don’t remember the opening, but the missing fingers? Oh, yesssssssss.

    Opening: 45 cents for a brandy!

    3 on a match–I can see the problem in the trenches and foxholes. That’s long enough for a sniper to acquire a target.

16. Quentin Tarantino re-used this meme as a part of

    Four Rooms

    And his segment directly refers to this episode of Hitchcock, though “obliquely”. Yeah, that’d make sense if you saw it.

    The movie is a four-segment dark comedy centering on the excellent acting talents of Tim Roth, while having quite a large cast of notables.

    I do recommend it for when you feel like a quirky film.

17. BTW, if you think about it, in one sense, it’s a non-fatal version of Russian Roulette.

HTML tags allowed in your comment: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>