A CENTURY Wola TOUGH OF EVIL: Murder, crime, betrayal, lust—there’s nothing like the pleasure of being drawn into a story of people who've broken the rules and crossed the usual boundaries of emotion. BY GuRTIs HANSON The Dark Side “7 WAS FRIDAY NIGHT, 1 WAS 15 YEARS OLD, AND aer parents were out of town. A neighbor family took me with them to the La Reina theater on Ventura Boulevard in Encino, Cali o see Alfred Hitcheock’s latest, “Vertigo.” By the time the movie ended, I would never be the same again. That night, alone in the house, Twas fjghtened. I had nightmares. But I couldnt wait to gp back and see the movie again. And again, ‘Why? Because it had a hypnotic quality? Because it moved me at the same time it frightened me? Because Kim Novak was tverything I wanted ina woman? All that and more. Thad seen pure emotion on the screen, and I was intoxicated by it Ws been said. before that movies are like dreams, Movies that ex plore the darkside are the iment nightmares, they can fijghtenusinto an excited and vulnerable state and ‘confront us with emotions fand images we fear. The best convey a vision so personal that we, as ina ‘ream, fee submerged in the psyche of the story- collaborative, but there's tno question whose emo- tions are being revealed “cool Kelly, Eva Marie Saint Vera Miles, Tippi Hed= zen—is well known and on view in many of his fms, but in “Vertigo” the viewer is plunged into the depths ofthe compli cated emotional relationship Hitcheock had with his feminine ‘deal, James Stewart's obsession for Kim Novak encompasses ‘voyeurism, fantasy lst, eruel manipulation and love of death. Recent disclosures that Hitcheock’s behavior in private lie Contis Hanson is the director of°L.A. Confidential, “The River Wild” and “The Hand That Rocks the Cradle 180¥: Leopoldine Konstantin, Ingrid Ber caught inthe tangled web of Hitchcock's Notorious’ (1946) echoed some ofthese predilections ae oflitle surprise or inter~ testo the viewer of" Vertigo”: having experienced the revelato- ty billiance of his art, who cares about the relatively mundane ‘Ways his emotions manifested themselves in real ife? ‘Working on the dark side has freed numerous directors of their emotional reticence. Raoul Walsh made many admirable pictures, but it was James Cagney's obsessive love for his ‘mother in the violent mastorpicee “White Heat” that still packs an emotional wallop today. There is sex between gang- Stor Cagney and his moll Viginia Mayo and between ‘and study gunsel Steve Cochran, but when Cagney er Into his mother’s lp, we gt into the realm of tue passion ‘Lurid, lamboyantly exhibitionist, as palpably nasty as the murky war ters ofthe eanal featured in ts climax. “Touch of Evil” has always been ny favorite—and for me the most influental—of (Orson Wells's fils, as ‘much for its uninhibited excesses ag for its star ting briliance. This labyrinthine tale (which is being re-released this fallina re-edited version eloser to Welles's origi- ral intentions) also con- tains the most heartfel, love story. in Wells's body of work. 1's not the one between Charl- ton Heston and Janet Leigh, as the ads would suggest, but rather the torturous relationship between Wells's characior and that of his loyal sidekick, played by Joseph Calle. Welles’s pragmatic and astute police chief ‘Quinlan is assisted, idolized, loved by his heartsick deputy ‘who would rather die for him than betray him—andl who ult= mately does both, ‘Dorothy Hughes's novel ofa serial killer provides the spring board for the most haunting ofall Hollywood-hased love sto- tes, Nicholas Ray's “In a Lonely Place.” A murder investiga- ls wan and Claude Rains wewsweex sexerat issue 61TOUGH GUYS: (Clockwise from top) Cagney broil in White Heat,’"Taxi Driver’ Robert De Niro, Humphrey Bogart roughs up Peter Lorrein “The Maltese Falcon, John Travolta and Samuel Jackson pull the trigger in Pulp Fiction’ tion causes Humphrey Bogar’s nearpaychoie screenwriter land Gloria Grahame’ aspiring acttes to cole in relation: ‘hip fueled by sexual attraction and personal volatility. At Sst thet Tove failing an apparent oais nthe emotional w land behind the fade of movieland glamour. And thea it erups tor apart by suspicion, jealousy and ea, Reportedly ting director Ray's ow marital Breakup with leading ad Grahame, the disolation is devastating pain Emotion, orth fear of losing it, wth all its potential for happiness and pein i what "Invasion ofthe Body Snatchers isalabout Don Siege lean, efelent retort style was a perfect match for Jack Finney frightening novel of debuman- rence Ce Le peeripeatrsi es a ey Eves rc se ie an Tho Third Man, 1948. Carol Reod’s pees ected Strangers ona Tran, 1951. Superb smurder-swapping suspense, pee eet Lean tis See ee pee erence Dee Resnenine ent enet ete postinodernnoirby Tarantino, ization, which is told from the matter oF at point of view of servant doctor wo has the misfortune to fallin love just, ‘5 the capacity for loves being destroyed. Though thas been remade twice and imitated many times, no version comes clone o Siegel orginal in terms of escalating terror and the in “The Naked Kiss” Sam Fuller tls the story of a re- formed prostitute (Constance Towers) who fas n Tove with ‘town's most upstanding etn, but his mask of respectabil- iy falls away inthe act of making love and a sex pervert is revealed, Hypoerie is everywhere in ths bleak dstection of toclety. Among the most eiotional ofall filmmakers, Fuller new no fear, and his bald, eecentre cinema con fuse and confounded ents uncomfortable with tmninbted passion in storyteling The passage of time has made his pictures lee shocking. more palatable, which explains why the eit’ opinion this movies and the others mentioned here has risen dramatically in the years since their fst release ‘These were among the fms and filmmakers that made me want to make movies in the Ost Place, the ones who made me aware there was Somebody behind the eamers telling the story, entertaining the audience and giving them some: thing extra They azo showed that movies which take us to the da side canbe among the richest emotionally and thematically: That's what makes {se want to see them again and agin, lng afer the plot no longer keep us guessing. This true tven when they fl short ofthe dizzying inton cating heights of “Vertigo.” .A CentURY OF Movigs Honor Roll: A Garlan Based on more than 1,500 ballots sent to film notables, the American Film Institute rated the top US. movies, spanning a century that saw film evolve into a major American art form 1 Paycho +1000 19 Chinatown 1974 © orson Wats inGtzon Kane" 1 One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Neste1975@)JackWehalson ra ” @ Humphrey Bogart @ Marton Brando *Q care abl and Ven ei