Otto Preminger and the Moving Camera: Feminist Attunement in Whirlpool
Fig. 8 | The predatory Korvo breaks down Ann’s internal resistance in order to subject her to a form of psychological rape, 00:18:03. 20th Century Fox, 1950.
Fig. 9 | As Ann sinks deeper into the hypnotic abyss into which Korvo is pulling her, her perspective becomes blurry and out of focus, the clarity of her (in)sight giving way to the haze of Korvo’s influence, 00:18:21. 20th Century Fox, 1950.
Fig. 10 | Preminger uses typical classical Hollywood glamor lighting as Ann begins to sink into the hypnotic abyss, 00:18:22. 20th Century Fox, 1950.
Fig. 11 | Preminger then uses a lighting effect to swallow her in darkness as she finally sinks into the hypnotic abyss, 00:18:36. 20th Century Fox, 1950.
with the conventions of melodrama, invoking them only to subvert them.) On the contrary, she seems almost mystified by the picture. While she is lost in thought, Preminger dollies in from a medium shot to a medium close-up, at which point Ann hears a door close downstairs. Knowing that her husband has finished his session and is coming upstairs from his office, Ann whips her head around at the sound and leans forward into close-up, a look of abject terror on her face. This is an object-defined camera movement. Preminger’s choice to shrink the space and dolly in on Ann is expressive of her domestic
claustrophobia, her sense of suffocation in the role of Mrs. Dr. Bill Sutton (Figs. 5-7).8 For as inspired as these early sequences are, however, nowhere is Preminger’s aesthetic ingenuity on greater display than the sequence in which Korvo hypnotizes Ann. Following their initial meeting at the Wilshire Store, Korvo asks Ann to lunch. Ann assumes that Korvo intends to blackmail her for his silence, but instead he provides her with the Wilshire Store’s file on the shoplifting incident and encourages her to tear it up so that there is no record of the incident. Taken in by Korvo’s charm and friendly
For an exceptionally nuanced analysis of Tierney’s character with reference to clinical psychology, specifically borderline personality disorder and the work of Marsha Linehan, see Chapter 3 in Julie Grossman’s Rethinking the Femme Fatale in Film Noir.
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Vol.05, No.02 | Winter 2020