Rope Unleashed (2001)
*** 1/2 (out of 4)
Entertaining making of featurette features interviews with Pat Hitchcock, Hume Cronyn, Arthur Laurents and Farley Granger as they discuss Alfred Hitchcock's ROPE. Pat doesn't have too much to say throughout the thing nor does Cronyn outside of explaining how he ended up writing a treatment early on in production. From here the majority of the screen time is devoted to screenwriter Laurents who is clearly not overly impressed with the movie. I will say that I'm a huge fan of the movie and feel it to be an underrated gem so hearing some of Laurents comments took me by surprised. I don't mind the fact that we have different opinions on the movie but it is refreshing watching one of these featurettes and not just have it being some love fest where everyone talks about how great everything was. Laurents starts off talking about how no one wanted to be reminded that this story was based on an actual case and there's also talk of why people wanted every bit of the homosexuality left out. There's talk of Cary Grant turning down the James Stewart role and then the screenwriters goes on to talk about why Stewart was bad in the part. Laurents also talks about his objection to Hitchcock showing the murder early on and how this killed all the suspense in the movie. Granger also talks about how difficult it was shooting in ten minute rounds as the cast had to remember their lines, watch their step and it appears the director was more interested in the technical side of things. No matter your opinion on the film you should find yourself entertained by this featurette. Again, it's good that the studio allowed the writer to speak his mind on issues that he had with the film even if I didn't agree with him. It's also fun hearing from Granger who gets to discuss what it was like working with the famed director.
