The Vertigo of Wokeism

The art-vs-artist discourse has become increasingly simple-minded. That's why mirrors, including the mirrors provided by "nasty" art, are important

- Jai Arjun Singh

AS an adolescent movie buff in the early 1990s who became fascinated by old cinema largely through the work of Alfred Hitchcock, I had read enough to know that Hitchcock’s treatment of some of his leading ladies (and his gay or bisexual leading men) could be sadistic. And that Tippi Hedren had been a target of much bullying during the filming of The Birds. However, it wasn’t until a decade ago—partly through the Donald Spoto book Spellbound by Beauty—that I learnt of Hedren’s stronger allegations: that Hitchcock made clearly inappropriate demands on her, “expected me to make myself sexually accessible”, and played a role in damaging her film career when she didn’t acquiesce.

These are some thoughts that flitted through my mind as I processed this. If everything Hedren said was true—and there didn’t seem any reason to disbelieve her—then, in a fairer world than the one we live in, he should have been held to account in some clear-cut way, depending on the magnitude of the offence: if not prosecuted by law, then at least prevented from further unmonitored exercising of power.

Of course, this is hypothetical: whether it’s a supposedly backward 1963 or a supposedly enlightened 2024, powerful people with connections routinely get away with crimes. And allegations that by their nature involve private encounters have to be proven, which provides loopholes to the culpable.

Meanwhile, another scrambled thought: there had been whis pers about Hitchcock’s nasty behaviour (criminal behaviour?) towards other performers like Vera Miles before he worked with Hedren. If he had been brought to book earlier, landmark films like Vertigo and Psycho may not have been made, or not made in the way that they were. This would have had a very large implication for film history, including the critical arguments of the 1960s, which centred on genre cinema.