Motifs and Spiral Staircases

Answering Question 1 of my initial Questions

Through watching the whole film Vertigo. I discovered that there were many motifs/symbols (recurring structures) and symbols that was visualised and that i discovered. Through me believing this, I researched online to back up this statement. I discovered that spirals is a major motif which occurs in the film.

The most physically jarring spiral is the one formed by the winding stairs of the bell tower as revealed from Scottie’s perspective. As he chases Madeleine up the stairs attempting to halt her apparent suicide, his acrophobia takes over and the camera shoots straight down the stairwell. His vertigo has made him powerless to save the woman he loves. The very structure of the film suggests a spiraling circularity: Scottie falls in love with Madeleine, loses her to death, then falls in love with Judy/Madeleine again, only to lose her to death as well. (http://www.sparknotes.com/film/vertigo/themes.html – accessed 2nd November 2009)

I wanted to understand and see whether this spiral motif was actually true. It is something which generally sticks out for me as a viewer. The use of the spiral staircase is quoted in a book.

‘The other quintessential Hitchcock image is the staircase. Again the easily films show ample use of this device for which his later work is known…The most common staircase shot is downward through a seeming spiral, which leaves the impression of stairs within stairs. One finds this shot from The Lodger through Vertigo as an embelem it recalls Peter Gynt’s onion, concentric layerings around a void, with the addition of danger that height always means in Hitchcock” (Yacowar,1977,P258-259)

Image founded on – http://faculty.cua.edu/johnsong/hitchcock/pages/stairs/stairs-2.html (Accessed 10th November 2009)

The use of spiral stairs adds to the effect of the character John suffering from the condition Vertigo as the spiral stairs adds the sense of dizziness and confusion which occurs in the illness. I also believed that the stairs may have been used for a further reason which I decided to research further. I came across a book by Michael Walker named ‘Hitchcock’s motives and title of the passage named ‘Freudian overtones’. I found an interesting quote to talk about the use of staircases.

“`steps, ladders or staircases, or as the case my be, walking up or down them are representations of the sexual act’ (Freud, 1900/1954:355). (Walker,2005,P366)

I was confused when reading this passage as I questioned myself and asked is the staircase to represent a sexual act? Reading another book made me understand the quote further ‘as any freudian dreambook would have told Hitchcock, dreaming that you can’t go up a flight of stairs is a symbol of importence’ (Hitchcock at work, Krohn, 2000).

‘Scottie’s attack of vertigo on the stairs symbolises his sexual failure with Madeleine’(Walker,2005,P367)

The Freudian overcome/ Freud theory explains and gives an account that Johns condition of vertigo and the signs of him feeling dizzy through the point of view shot is the sign of his masculinity crisis and his heterosexuality on the line.

Question 6. What was the purpose of Alfred Hitchcock using the distorted zoom shot of when John was looking down the stairs in the tower?

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