The scene sequence beginning at 60:46 could be
considered as the anticlimax to the suspicions we, the audience, have toward
the lodger. This scene, a flashback of the lodger’s past, is the key to the
movie; used to answer important questions that both the viewers and the
characters in the story have since the arrival of the lodger. By choosing to
show us the coming-out event of the lodger’s sister, we gather important
details about the lodger’s background. Judging by the mise-en-scene of this
sequence, we understand that he is of high status. We also gathered that he has
a mother and a sister, but his father is out of the picture for reasons
unknown. It clears up any suspicion we may have had of the lodger as the
murderer by providing the reasoning behind his strange behaviors. The fact that
the lodger’s purpose is revenge brings up the interesting idea that he is, in a
way, an “avenger”. From this scene we were able to understand why he rented a
room at the Bunting’s, his strange disappearance during the night of a murder,
and the possessions he locked up (his gun and a plan of the murders). All of these were previously used by Hitchcock
to make both the audience and the other characters infer their own connections between
the lodger and the Avenger. At 61:02
Hitchcock applied an interesting cinematography technique. In this scene, the
way the camera moved from a medium close-up of the lodger and his sister
dancing, and then slowly zoom out not just to a long shot but to an almost
extreme long shot, cause our point of view to move from that of the lodger to
the point of view of the murderer watching from afar. By subtly switching our
point of view from the lodger who is supposedly the narrator of the scene to
that of the murderer, Hitchcock maintains the viewers’ feeling of suspense even
in the anticlimax. Another note-worthy point about this scene is that instead
of revealing his background to the police by going along with them when they
arrested him, the lodger felt the need to run away and only explained to Daisy.
It is strange in that he must have realized that he would be treated to a fair
trial despite what evidence they had against him, so there would be no need for
him to run off. This action clearly is a way for Hitchcock to show the trust that
had formed between Daisy and the lodger.
You raise a fascinating point, Thuy: the idea that Hitchcock could provoke our suspense EVEN in an anticlimactic moment, which is the point at which suspense gets deflated. Hitchcock's not just interested in solving the "whodunit"; he uses a lot of other tools to get us invested in the film. Bravo!
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