Hitchcockian Portals: Shadows, Silhouettes and the Uncanny Threshold
MacGuffin Film Club Talks
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51m
From the silent era to the ‘70s, Hitchcock’s films are haunted with one oft-overlooked, recurring scene that lasts just long enough to make your heart skip one beat: the sudden appearance of a shadowy figure in a darkened doorway. The image conjures up Jung’s Unconscious—the Shadow—not to mention liminal states of all kinds. These apparitions cannot be fully explained in psychological terms. Looming up as an irruption—a true interruption—they perturb the flow of the story, injecting it with a pungent whiff of the eldritch. Once you notice it, you can’t stop spotting what must have a been a minor obsession for the director. It even figures as his final cameo, in Family Plot! In this talk, I’ll provide an overview of these eerie moments and consider how they point to the positive presence of Mystery itself.
Known for his killer slideshows, Joel's talks bring an immersive, cinematic experience to your screen. Hitchcockian Portals will put you inside some of Hitchcock's eeriest movie moments.
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