These reviews underscore a key tension found throughout much of Brooks\u2019 work: the relationship (and friction) between \u201chomage\u201d and \u201csatire.\u201d The best Brooks films are often those that straddle the line between admiration and condemnation. In The Producers <\/em>(1967) and Blazing Saddles <\/em>(1974), one feels the love Brooks has for Broadway and the Western genre, but also the disgust for the ugly sides of these enterprises, like greed and racism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In her review, Kael alludes to an understanding of satire as something more elevated than parody or \u201cimitation.\u201d Ebert seems to agree. Yet both<\/a> admired<\/a> Young Frankenstein <\/em>(1974), <\/em>a film with a similar tone and reverence for its source material, treating it with far less bite than the aforementioned two films. <\/em>Definitions are always porous. And while there are satirical elements at play in Young Frankenstein, <\/em>its visual and thematic homages and plays on genre convention are what make the film so great. It is also easier to see what Brooks and Gene Wilder (who co-wrote the script) are up to in the work, and how it fits into an existing tradition of movies that adapt, expand, and reimagine Mary Shelley\u2019s novel, like Bride of Frankenstein <\/em>(James Whale; 1935) or Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein <\/em>(Charles Barton; 1948). <\/p>\n\n\n\n The problem with High Anxiety <\/em>may be that it came too early to be fully appreciated in the same way as Young Frankenstein. <\/em>While the latter is a superior film and masterpiece of movie comedy, the former is a first-rate film and underappreciated part of Brooks\u2019 oeuvre. It deserves more attention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n High Anxiety <\/em>stars Brooks as Richard Thorndyke, a psychiatrist who suffers from \u201chigh anxiety.\u201d It is the name of a character Cary Grant might play, an affliction reminiscent of Vertigo <\/em>(1958), and a profession that recalls Spellbound <\/em>(1945) and the Freudian elements that preoccupy so much of Hitchcock\u2019s work. Set mostly in San Francisco, Thorndyke attends a conference on psychoanalysis. Things go wrong when he faces a false accusation of murder and must go on the run to prove his innocence, a situation often faced by Hitchcock\u2019s protagonists. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Brooks came of age on a diet of Hitchcock. If Brooks had not said as much in interviews<\/a>, it would be clear from his filmmaking. Hitchcock\u2019s status in America, the legend goes, did not reach the level of serious \u201cartist\u201d until the critics-turned-directors of Cahiers du Cinema<\/em> began to champion his work. When Fran\u00e7ois Truffaut arrived in the United States, he was surprised<\/a> to find that Americans did not hold Hitchcock in the same regard. The reception motivated the writing of his famous interview book, published in 1966, the work many credit for helping Hitchcock\u2019s artistry reach the level it deserved. But many of the next generation of filmmakers, like Brooks, already knew of his greatness. <\/p>\n\n\n\n To watch the 2015 documentary Hitchcock\/Truffaut <\/em>is to see the reaches of Hitchcock\u2019s style and innovation. There are the more obvious examples: Brian De Palma was dubbed the \u201cnew Hitchcock<\/a>.\u201d Martin Scorsese turned to the shower scene from Psycho <\/em>(1960) as a \u201ctemplate<\/a>\u201d for the key fight scene in Raging Bull <\/em>(1980). And Gus Van Sant, of course, remade Psycho <\/em>shot-for-shot in 1998, a failed cinematic experiment in the eyes of many, but an interesting one nonetheless. The greatness of Hitchcock\u2019s imagery and style is often at its most palpable when borrowed by others, as Brooks does here. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For example, at the end of Brooks\u2019 hilarious reimagining of the Psycho <\/em>shower scene, in which an angry bellhop \u201cstabs\u201d Thorndyke with a newspaper, the black newsprint swirls around the shower drain, just like the blood of Marion Crane (Janet Leigh). The gesture recalls the black-and-white of Hitchcock\u2019s film and the uncanny horror of watching blood drain devoid of its redness. Similarly, when a character finds himself trapped by web-like shadows in a mansion, it evokes the trauma experienced by characters like those played by Joan Fontaine in Rebecca <\/em>(1940) and Suspicion <\/em>(1941). <\/p>\n\n\n\n Brooks manages to find the humor in these situations, but in doing so also reveals his own command of film language. Move beyond the cheesy one-liners and wordplay to which critics like Kael referred, and one finds a semi-experimental reworking of some of Hitchcock\u2019s most dramatic moments, not just in terms of narrative, but also visual composition. What High Anxiety <\/em>lacks in satirical bite, it makes up for in its play with (and appreciation of) form. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The French critics who championed Hitchcock were the ones who put forth the auteur <\/em>theory. Nearly a decade before Truffaut, Claude Chabrol and Eric Rohmer wrote a Hitchcock book of their own, tracing through lines of the director\u2019s work. In a sense, High Anxiety <\/em>is the ultimate tribute to auteurism, showing how even scenes from Hitchcock films that radically differ in plot, style, and tone can come to form a cohesive whole. That Brooks manages this – while scoring laughs at the same time – is a testimony to both Hitchcock\u2019s and his own greatness as a filmmaker. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But in another way, High Anxiety <\/em>also decenters the auteur. <\/em>With its deliberate assemblage of otherwise dissimilar homages and references, the film calls attention to form: camera movements, lighting, music, and editing. By recreating and recontextualizing the cinema of Hitchcock in this way, it reminds the viewer, or at least this one, that a director\u2019s style is the byproduct of many hands and visions. And in that sense, High Anxiety<\/em> is a beautiful homage, and dare I say, critique, of the genius of \u201cHitchcock,\u201d whoever that might be. High Anxiety is currently streaming on HBO Max<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/high-anxiety-scaled-1024x576.jpg\")
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