Abstract:

This article considers Alfred Hitchcock’s work in

relation to the connotations of ‘fallacy’ within conventional

settings of modern Western society. Focusing on two films,

Strangers on a Train (1951) and Rear Window (1954), we point

to the phenomenon of the incidental push that leads toward an

inextricable entanglement of characters, events, and psychic

forces in what appear to be logical courses of action. We name

this push ‘the Hitchcockian nudge’.

Key words:

Hitchcockian nudge, aesthetics of deception;

fallacy, suspense, gaze