1958 New York, New York

Guy Cyr

1944

New York, New York

Interviewed on 9/21/2019

by Shazidur Talukder

I surprisingly remember my first movie very clearly, even though it was so long ago. It was the Alfred Hitchcock movie called Vertigo. I think it was a great movie to be my first one, but I distinctly remember feeling somewhat strange after it. I went with a couple of my friends to the New York Theatre; I believe it’s called the Globe Theatre now. It definitely wasn’t received well by the audience but now if you check it’s on a whole bunch of lists because of how great it is.

I definitely didn’t catch a lot of the intricacies about the plot and messages when I watched it that first time but I was only a teenager. This was when I first moved to New York with my parents from the Midwest and it was so different. Overwhelming but in that way that makes you feel like you’re finally somewhere things will happen, you know? That sounds like a line from every movie that takes place in New York, but young me really felt that. And going to the movies was my little way to take part in something of the everything that was happening all around.

Vertigo is about a man who lost his job and is hired by a friend to follow the friend’s wife. He becomes obsessed with her and becomes really sad when she dies. There’s another woman later on who is the friend’s mistress, and he becomes obsessed with her too. I wouldn’t say it was inappropriate but it was pretty heavy material for me. Now I watch comedies because I take everything else seriously enough that I want a break from that. I felt bad for the main character at first because of the way he lost his job, it wasn’t so much pathetic as it was empathy inducing. But I think my opinion of him was pretty much all over the place because of how he fell in love with his friend’s wife but at the same time also obsessed with women who looked very similar to each other. It was definitely not a feel-good movie, so I can see why people might not have liked it at first. It is however, centered on a murder, which I have a soft spot for. Isn’t it interesting how true crime has such an expanding audience these days? Public opinion might have shifted over these years but I think people my age are still just a little bit uncomfortable with true crime as a genre.

I remember one of my friends telling me about how even though the movie might not be that great, he had read about some new technology at the time that let the filmmakers show the feeling of vertigo on the screen much better, so that was interesting. The effect wasn’t on screen for as long as you would think for a movie called vertigo.

I don’t remember too much about the movie theater itself, since at the time I was a little more taken by the idea of the theater. A fantastical part of me imagined I was at a movie premier, with all the talented actors and people with the vision. The plush red carpeting inside the theater just helped this mental image I had. I thought it was a pretty grown up thing to do at the time; I was on my own, with friends but not family, and I was consuming something of an art. It was a pretty late showing and I got home pretty late.

There was a concession stand! And everything was as overpriced then as it is now, but I made it a point to get popcorn because it was the thing to do when watching a movie and I wanted to have the full experience.

I think that because of my first movie watching experience going so well, I also developed a fascination with art with other mediums as well. I ended up studying art in school, and I feel that I’m a little more opinionated than most other people when it comes to critiquing movies, or just taking them in.