Books in Brief: The Dark Side of Genius

The Dark Side of Genius: The Life of Alfred Hitchcock, by Donald Spoto (Little, Brown, 594 pp., $20). Donald Spoto’s new biography of Alfred Hitchcock wears its seriousness on its sleeve; what other book about a Hollywood director makes pointed reference to both Chesterton and Flannery O’Connor? Unlike most film-related biographies, though, The Dark Side of Genius really is worth taking seriously. Leaving to others the purely technical aspect of Hitchcock’s achievement, Spoto focuses instead on more personal matters: Hitchcock’s revealing penchant for peculiarly vicious practical jokes; the true extent of his “authorial” control; the darkly private obsessions that gradually found their way into his later work—both on screen (Vertigo) and off (the “discovery” of Tippi Hedren). While Hitchcock would certainly have been appalled by Spoto’s amply documented candor, he might also have been rather pleased to find himself the subject of so thoughtful and intelligent a biography; one may assume, after all, that the maker of Shadow of a Doubt, Strangers on a Train, Vertigo, and North by Northwest knew his own worth.