CANNES, May 26: Alfred Hitchcock’s masterly thriller ‘Vertigo’ received a resounding new life when its leading actress Kim Novak presented the film restored from its ruins more than half a century after it was first made.
Novak, 80, turned up at the 66th Cannes Film Festival last night for the screening of ‘Vertigo’ in the Cannes Classics section for restored films. The Hollywood star received a standing ovation from the Cannes festival audience before the newly-restored version of the film was shown.
“It is such an honour and privilege to be here,’ Novak said before the screening of the film, made in 1958. ‘For me, Cannes has always been a special place in the world because this is a place you celebrate life. There are few places in the world today where you celebrate life,” she added.
Novak, whose acting opposite James Stewart in ‘Vertigo’ earned her critical acclaim as ‘the greatest performance by a female actor’, asked the audience to believe in themselves and don’t give up on their dreams.
“When ‘Vertigo’ was first made, I liked the film but the reviews were not good. Suddenly people believe in it after half a century and it shows how things can change with times. It also shows you shouldn’t give up on your dreams,” she said.
In a 1996 critics’ poll, ‘Vertigo’ was named the ‘greatest film ever made’.
Novak paid tributes to Hitchcock, saying “he was a good man and a professional man”. About James Stewart, she said: “He was like the good neighbour you wish to have. I wish he could have been cloned.”
In her third appearance at the Cannes festival, the actor described ‘Vertigo’ as a ‘true mystery’. ‘I have seen my film five times before,’ she said, adding ‘he (Hitchcock) truly made a mystery’.
(UNI)
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