Themes and Plot Devices in The Films of Alfred Hitchcock - Transference of Guilt

Transference of Guilt

As related in articles by Francois Truffaut, Claude Chabrol, Eric Rohmer and others in the French film magazine Cahiers du Cinema -- and in Chabrol and Rohmer's book Hitchcock (Paris: Éditions Universitaires, 1957) -- Hitchcock often sets up a villain/antagonist who has a dark secret. In the course of the film, Hitchcock, through the screenplay and the filming, makes it clear that the hero/protagonist somehow shares in this secret or guilt. Examples include:

• Suspicion (1941): Lina (Joan Fontaine) suspects her husband (Cary Grant) as a murderer, and allows this suspicion to ruin their life, even when he is revealed to be innocent.
• Shadow of a Doubt (1943): after Uncle Charlie (Joseph Cotten) is revealed as a murderer, his niece, Young Charlie (Teresa Wright) says she will kill him if he doesn't leave the household.
• Lifeboat (1944): the Allied shipwreck victims attack the German captain (Walter Slezak) after several days, in what amounts to a lynching.
• Strangers on a Train (1951): Guy (Farley Granger) goes along with Bruno (Robert Walker) because Guy does want to kill his wife.
• Rear Window (1954): Jeffries (James Stewart) spies on his neighbors, hoping to catch a murderer (Raymond Burr), leading to dubious tactics to catch the criminal
• Vertigo (1958): Scottie (James Stewart) follows Madeleine (Kim Novak) and unwittingly accepts the story of Madeleine's life from her husband, indirectly causing her death.
• Psycho (1960): in a reversal of the usual pattern, a character who appears to be the heroine, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), commits a crime, is murdered, and the audience's sympathy is transferred to an ambiguous character Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins).