Opinion: The baluster in the background

So last week I watched a couple of holiday films, Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds” and then, “Psycho.” Two films I’ve managed to miss. They are on Netflix right now in case you’re looking to get into the holiday spirit.

I jest, of course, and as a photographer and filmmaker myself (I finished a wildlife documentary this year that should be on teevee at some point and I’m in post production on another one about a farm with 600-year-old trees) I don’t watch films like a normal human.

I find myself examining scenes and light and wondering out loud on how this, that, or another thing was done, and since I’ve gotten into doing a little woodworking, I even notice the cabinets, which is really weird. Like, when Norman Bates was attacking a victim, I was admiring the baluster in the background.

But the big thing I noticed in both Hitchcock films was how people got out of cars. In several scenes they slid across the front seat (plenty of cars had bench seats back then) and they got out of the passenger door.

I ask this to folks who were adults in the ‘60s, was this a thing? And if so, why? The explanation on the Internet says safety was a factor, as streets were narrower and it is safer to get out the passenger side. But isn’t that why you have a rear-view mirror? And I’m not sure things are really any safer today. Get out near the Post Office in Columbia Falls sometime.

The only time I can recall sliding over and getting out of the passenger seat was when either my door was broken or frozen or I was actually a passenger

As far as the movies themselves, I liked “Psycho” better than “The Birds.” Anthony Perkins was a much perkier killer than I thought he’d be in “Psycho.” “The Birds” was good for its time period and had some memorable scenes, most notably a shot of a flock of birds flying down onto the unsuspecting town as shot from above the birds (not sure how he pulled that off back then) and then the very last scene of just a huge sea of birds spread out before the family as they slowly leave the house, not sure if they’ll be eaten alive. (Spoiler Alert! Can you have a spoiler alert on a 64-year-old movie?)

I’m not done with Hitchcock either, I’m currently watching one of his early films, “Rebecca” which is completely free on YouTube.

It’s not great, but it’s not bad, either. 

It has some really nice cabinets in many of the scenes, as if, you know, you’d notice.

——-

A few months ago I wrote about my one foot freezing during a backcountry camping trip to Glacier’s Fifty Mountain and a woman had a great suggestion: She just stuffs a pair of wool socks into the bottom of her sleeping bag and keeps them there. She also puts handwarmers in there, too. If it gets cold, she puts them on. You just have to remember to put them back when you’re done, of course, something I’m sure I would screw up. One of the most unpleasant things about most of my backcountry trips is I invariably end up with wet feet. I take off the wet socks, go to bed, and then put the wet socks back on in the morning (sometimes they’re frozen). I think if I had dry ones in the bag, I’d never have the will to leave them there. They’d end up on my feet.