Influences of Hitchcock in recent thrillers (1 Viewer)

[Stevan Lay]

How about Frailty & Red Dragon.
Frailty is particularly obvious during the end sequence and a specific vital scene. Bill Paxton even pays tribute to the man himself in the making of... DVD featurette.

 

[Holadem]

From the scathing reply I got from calling Rosemary's Baby Hitchcockian, it seems you can not say Hitch and supernatural in the same sentence, which rules out Frailty.

--
Holadem

 

[Eric Stewart]

You could compare and contrast The Bourne Identity with something like Spellbound, in which the hero also has amnesia and travels about with a woman who has fallen for him. You could throw in North by Northwest as well, in which the hero similarly lacks an identity ("What does the 'O' [in Roger O. Thornhill] stand for?" "Nothing.").

As for Bourne, I would echo Roger Ebert and say, "The movie's brutally cynical happy ending reveals that it doesn't take itself seriously. And we catch on (sooner than Marie) that the girl stays in the picture only because--well, there has to be a girl, to provide false suspense and give the loner hero someone to talk to." In Spellbound, the "girl" (Ingrid Bergman) is instrumental in rescuing the hero. In North by Northwest, though the ending is a frothy one, it is morally grounded in what happens in the prior plot. Bourne's "brutally cynical happy ending" reveals that the whole plot is entirely ungrounded, morally speaking. Though the film is formally very much akin to Hitchcock, it comes to nothing other than giving us a suspense thrill ride. Even Hitch's frothiest films were a working out of moral questions, particularly those relating (if only elliptically) to sexual guilt.

Sexual guilt, I would say, has no role in the Bourne universe. In Hitch's films it is always there, right under the surface. For example, what of Cary Grant's relationship with his mother at the start of North by Northwest. Oedipal, or no? What of the fact that Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman can't keep their hands off each other in Spellbound, though she's his doctor? Ethical, or no?

 

[Rich Malloy]

There's a lot of "The Birds" in "Signs", but I really don't think "Panic Room" is particularly Hitchcockian. The titles may look like something by Saul Bass, and the single location may feel vaguely similar to "Rope" or "Lifeboat" or "Rear Window", but I don't find this movie (or any of Fincher's) to be particularly Hitchcockian.
The most Hitchcockian film I've seen in recent years, from the titles to the choice of source material and the style of filmmaking, would be "The Talented Mr. Ripley".
And if you're looking at De Palma, don't forget "Obsession" which is a self-conscious retelling of "Vertigo" and one of De Palma's better films IMO.

 

[Rich Malloy]

Oh, wait a minute... from 2002 only? In addition to a smattering of allusions to "The Birds" in "Signs", I guess Nolan's remake of "Insomnia" would sorta fit the bill. Still, I think you're going to have to do a fair bit of contorting to fit most of the films you're considering within the bounds of your thesis. In other words, a bit of a stretch, I think.

 

[Kirk Tsai]

Now now people, aren't we forgetting the tribute to Vertigo that is Stuart Little 2?
Seriously though, Michael's suggestion of Murder By Numbers is a good one. Not only does its plot echo Rope, so does its homoerotic undertones, which of course exists in other Hitchcock films as well, such as Strangers on a Train.

 

[Darren H]

An odd choice, but the most Hitchcockian film I've seen this year is Punch-Drunk Love.