whenever one watches Alfred Hitchcock's masterpiece, Rope, the first element of
filmmaking that comes to mind is the setting. We along with the characters
spend the entirety of the film in one location. Rope wasn't the first film to
exist solely in one location, but it certainly remains the most fascinating.
It's like watching an episode of Murder She Wrote or reading an Agatha Christie
novel, except our detective is merely a teacher and our criminals are already
identified by the third frame of the film. Rope is often lumped in with other
films in the mystery genre yet it plays out like a bonafide courtroom drama in
the house of a student. The mystery is erased before we even hear an ounce of
dialogue. So, why exactly is rope so unequivocally engaging? The film is
comprised entirely of just ten segments, with Hitchcock having pushed the
boundaries of 35-millimeter to its limit in 1948. Now, back then you could only
shoot ten minutes at a time before needing to change the reel. Rather than
it being a limitation, though, Hitchcock pushed the boundaries to turn it into a
positive. After all, the first segment of the film that opens on the strangulation
close-up, and ends with a blackout on Brandon's back, lasts exactly nine
minutes and 34 seconds. Most fascinating is that Hitchcock wanted the film to
have a documentary, fly-on-the-wall type feel. It was supposed to be a Nietszchian
insight into the mind of someone deciding to play God - deciding who lives
and who dies due to their own superiority complex.
to ramp up this
notion of the audience spying on a delicate situation
Hitchcock decided to make the film look as though it was entirely shot in one
take. Due to the aforementioned limitations though it was impossible to
shoot 80 minutes of footage in one take. Instead, the master of suspense decided
to disguise his takes and hide them in the final edit. Allowing the film to flow
as though there are no takes places emphasis on the overarching theme of the
story: manipulation. We see two students, Brandon and Phillip, spin their web of
lies before attempting to humanize their actions through various moments of
dialogue with the victim's family and friends.
... that one take aesthetic
allows Hitchcock to explore the nastiness of the upper class while also inviting the
audience to join him. Without smart disguised camerawork and editing, this
film would not be able to hammer home any of those complex themes. Constant
cutting would also make the overall image bland or nauseating. Since the film
is shot entirely in one location, time passes by naturally and the characters
interact naturally. Ironically, it's the unnatural style of editing - for its time
of course - that allows the film to feel organic. Hitchcock disguises his cuts
marvelously and for the time in which it was shot quite ingeniously. It paved the
way for a more creative style of editing, one that accompanies the film's flow
rather than sticking out like a sore thumb. One of the most interesting hidden
cuts is within the first segment - a moment where Brandon steps in front of
the camera... his suave blue blazer engulfs the lens.
Momentarily that allows Hitchcock to make the cut before resuming the scene
from the same exact moment only with Brandon now walking ahead of the camera.
These cuts simply hide in plain sight and give Rope a free-flowing structure
that makes the possibilities for character interactions seem endless. It
almost feels like, at any given moment, the room could explode in hysteria and
arguments. That unsteadiness is contributed to by the editing. One thing
that has always stood out in regards to the editing is that, yes, there are only
10 cuts - five of those are dissolve effects, the other five are hard cuts
like the one mentioned before. Hitchcock as an auteur was obsessive. Every cut and
every frame had to be perfect. It is no coincidence, then, that his ten cuts are
divided equally. As I said before: five dissolves and five hard cuts. This
patterned structure makes the editing less obvious. It's less interested in
diverting audience attention rather merging into our consciousness without
questions being asked. Momentum is never lost nor coherence sacrificed. The
pattern of the editing keeps the audience trapped in the same room as two
murderers hearing their lies and attempts to humanise their heinous act.
The real suspense here is that Hitchcock gives the audience an insight, but
removes our voices. We are powerless in alerting the victim's teacher, friends
and family members. we are forced to watch it unfold knowing that any bit of
tension could erupt into another violent act of crime. For me, though, it's quite
staggering to hear Hitchcock's words on the film 20 years later in an interview
with Francois Truffaut. "It was a stunt the British filmmaker said and one that I
really don't know how I came to indulge in." Despite the director's reservations toward
Rope's aesthetic, many still find it to be a master class in minimalistic editing
and a solid foundation of shooting practices. It paved the way for freedom
in handheld filmmaking and was the first real film to generate
a discussion about the merits and art of editing.
When I mention the following films, I want you to keep in mind that they are all
similar in one regard... even though it may not seem so: Creed, Anchorman, Back to
the Future, Birdman and Silent House... now how are all these
different films and genres connected? They all contain hidden cuts - the method
Hitchcock pioneered in Rope in order to achieve smoother and more consistent
scenes. The fights in Creed are a primary example, likewise the entirety of Birdman.
Without Hitchcock's pioneering of such methods, editing may never have reached
the levels it has today. Those moments of smoothness and immersion may never have
evolved if not for Hitchcock's Rope. Much is said about his excellence as a master
storyteller and crafter of suspense, but Hitchcock was as much a visionary in the
technical art of filmmaking as he was the storytelling side of things...