From Hitchcock to Shyamalan – on logic, plausibility, and the joys of being manipulated

(From my Economic Times column)
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Reading a book about Alfred Hitchcock recently, I saw one of his quotable quotes, a response to viewers who demand plausibility in every scene. “Film should be stronger than logic,” Hitch said.

People who have low tolerance for “escapist” films, or for exciting genres like suspense, horror or fantasy, might see this as an artistic cop-out – a sign that a massy filmmaker is taking the “anything goes if I can provide easy thrills” route, and mounting a cheap defence of his approach. (“My films aren’t slices of life, they are slices of cake,” Hitchcock also glibly said once.)

But for some of us, this makes perfect sense: when we put ourselves in the hands of a director who is in control of his material, we are willing to be “played like an organ” (to cite yet another Hitchcock quote!) in the dark hall. By the way, I’m also waggling my eyebrows now at dull champions of subdued realism who disapprove of lush background music in a film – even if it’s a gorgeous score – because it manipulates their emotions. As if such manipulation hasn’t always been one of the many functions of cinema, or of any art.

These things don’t follow an easily quantifiable pattern, of course – we all have deal-breakers. One of my favourite Hitchcock films is the 1951 Strangers on a Train**, but I am conflicted about its famous climactic scene where the hero and the villain battle on an out-of-control fairground carousel. The first time I watched that scene, I felt an adrenaline rush, but the effect only lasted that one time. On subsequent viewings I have cringed at the shot when a cop fires randomly in the direction of the round-about (which has plenty of people, including children, on it!) and plugs the fairground attendant by mistake – which is what sets the action going. That crazy act took me out of the narrative, and it wasn’t helped by the shaky back-projection that followed.

In recent weeks, though, I had some very good experiences with suspension-of-disbelief movies – including three different types of horror films, each requiring that you submit to a particular improbability. The horror-romance Obsession gives us a new spin on the Monkey’s Paw trope (your biggest wish is granted, in a horribly twisted way), the creepy Hokum offers the possibility of a witch haunting an Irish hotel (in an otherwise realist narrative), and the agoraphobia-inducing Backrooms is about mysterious endless liminal spaces on the other side of a basement wall.

I happily succumbed to these conceits, went along for the ride. But my viewing highlight of last month was by a director many of us are ambivalent about (not least because he is one of “us”, who made a name for himself in Hollywood – and invited some brickbats, amidst scattered successes). Watching M Night Shyamalan’s 2024 thriller Trap alone, on a big home screen, I was riveted despite its loony premise (no spoiler: this is revealed in the first 10 minutes) of a serial-killer-cum-family-man learning that a trap has been set for him at a pop concert where he is accompanying his adolescent daughter.

As is the case with most of Shyamalan’s films, there is some clunky dialogue in Trap, and a case of unbelievably stupid behaviour by a character, in a scene that’s essential for the narrative to proceed. But awareness of these flaws didn’t affect my response to the film. I loved the pacing, the sense of claustrophobia, Josh Hartnett’s performance, the music score by Shyamalan’s daughter Saleka, who also plays the narrative’s pop-star, Lady Raven. And the sly little touches, such as the casting of 80-year-old Hayley Mills – who had played the twins in Parent Trap (1961) – in a story about a trapped parent.

With films that have a kinetic, emotional effect on you while you’re watching them – but which are sketchy in matters of logic or character behaviour – you often feel sheepish later in the cold light of day. But tellingly, I was just as engaged by Trap on a second viewing, and am still thinking about the film after weeks. Emotion overrode rationality, and that’s how it stayed. It’s great when that happens.

(More about Trap here.)

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**The book I mentioned at the start of the piece was about Strangers on a Train too - Criss-Cross, by Stephen Rebello. Rebello’s book about Psycho was another favourite back in the day, and this one is just as detailed, and perhaps even more personal. In his Author’s Note, Rebello mentions watching Strangers on a Train at a time of his own sexual awakening and being fascinated by the Bruno character – coded gay – and how the film views him. This bit reminded me of that great personal essay by Robin Wood in his Hitchcock book, about watching Rope in 1948 as a teenager and identifying with the John Dall character at a time when he was still trying to come to terms with his own homosexuality.

Among other things, this new book has some good stuff about the artistic clashes between Hitch and Raymond Chandler, who was initially hired to do the screenplay. A sample below.