Psychiatry isn't as simple as Spellbound would have you believe, the reasons for one's neuroses sure can't get cured with two or three sessions with Ingrid Bergman. But certain events can definitely be explained and it all seems quite reasonable when the explanations come from Alfred Hitchcock.
Spellbound gave both Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman their first Hitchcock films and their only film together. Peck arrives at a sanitarium to take the place of director Leo G. Carroll. But after a short time, the other psychiatrists realize that he's not all he seems.
In fact he's not a psychiatrist at all, but in fact a mental patient who has stolen the doctor's identity. The doctor has disappeared and in all likelihood been murdered. Peck flees the sanitarium, but Ingrid doesn't believe he's guilty of anything and she pursues and finds him and together they try to unravel what's locked up in his mind.
Back when I was in college I took an introductory psychology course to fill up my electives and Spellbound got to mean something to me then. I had a professor who I wasn't quite sure didn't belong in an asylum run by Leo G. Carroll. It was a running joke in the class that we were all in the midst of a Spellbound like drama that this man had killed the real professor and that at any time the men with the nets were going to drag our teacher away.
Episodes in Peck's life from childhood and the war and the trauma of seeing what happened to the real doctor have made him an amnesia case out of Peck. It's up to Ingrid to unravel it all by trying to interpret some recurring dreams.
The dream sequences involve some sets courtesy of Salvador Dali and it's the main reason that Spellbound is remembered today as opposed to being just another of Alfred Hitchcock's masterpieces. For fans of the great painter this film is a must.
Spellbound got a whole slew of nominations including Best Picture, Best Director and several more in technical categories. Spellbound and Alfred Hitchcock came up short against The Lost Weekend and Billy Wilder. Michael Chekov got a Best Supporting Actor nomination but lost to James Dunn for A Tree Grows In Brooklyn. Chekov plays Ingrid Bergman's mentor and he's right out of central casting as a Viennese Freudian psychiatrist.
Spellbound took home one award for Miklos Rosza's score and it will linger with you a long time after you've seen Spellbound.
Rhonda Fleming got her first critical notice as a homicidal mental patient, it's a brief but telling role. John Emery who is probably best known for being Tallulah Bankhead's husband plays a wolfish analyst on the make for Ingrid Bergman and plays it well.
When Bergman finally unravels it all, her final confrontation scene with the villain is one of Hitchcock's masterpieces. Talk about coolness under fire.
Though simplistic in its treatment of psychiatry, Spellbound will leave you just that when you see it.
Spellbound gave both Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman their first Hitchcock films and their only film together. Peck arrives at a sanitarium to take the place of director Leo G. Carroll. But after a short time, the other psychiatrists realize that he's not all he seems.
In fact he's not a psychiatrist at all, but in fact a mental patient who has stolen the doctor's identity. The doctor has disappeared and in all likelihood been murdered. Peck flees the sanitarium, but Ingrid doesn't believe he's guilty of anything and she pursues and finds him and together they try to unravel what's locked up in his mind.
Back when I was in college I took an introductory psychology course to fill up my electives and Spellbound got to mean something to me then. I had a professor who I wasn't quite sure didn't belong in an asylum run by Leo G. Carroll. It was a running joke in the class that we were all in the midst of a Spellbound like drama that this man had killed the real professor and that at any time the men with the nets were going to drag our teacher away.
Episodes in Peck's life from childhood and the war and the trauma of seeing what happened to the real doctor have made him an amnesia case out of Peck. It's up to Ingrid to unravel it all by trying to interpret some recurring dreams.
The dream sequences involve some sets courtesy of Salvador Dali and it's the main reason that Spellbound is remembered today as opposed to being just another of Alfred Hitchcock's masterpieces. For fans of the great painter this film is a must.
Spellbound got a whole slew of nominations including Best Picture, Best Director and several more in technical categories. Spellbound and Alfred Hitchcock came up short against The Lost Weekend and Billy Wilder. Michael Chekov got a Best Supporting Actor nomination but lost to James Dunn for A Tree Grows In Brooklyn. Chekov plays Ingrid Bergman's mentor and he's right out of central casting as a Viennese Freudian psychiatrist.
Spellbound took home one award for Miklos Rosza's score and it will linger with you a long time after you've seen Spellbound.
Rhonda Fleming got her first critical notice as a homicidal mental patient, it's a brief but telling role. John Emery who is probably best known for being Tallulah Bankhead's husband plays a wolfish analyst on the make for Ingrid Bergman and plays it well.
When Bergman finally unravels it all, her final confrontation scene with the villain is one of Hitchcock's masterpieces. Talk about coolness under fire.
Though simplistic in its treatment of psychiatry, Spellbound will leave you just that when you see it.