A Hitchcock a Day - Spellbound

A film that is one of the first that deals with psychoanalysis and especially the guilt complexes and it's released near the end of World War II? That's Hitchcock ladies and gentlemen. So, let's see what this film is about, shall we?

The beautiful Constance Peterson (Ingrid Bergman) is a young psychoanalyst that works at a mental hospital and doesn't have a personal life as she is always interested in her job.

When the new head of the institution arrives, however, everything changes. They immediately fall in love. But somethings disrupts their heaven. Dr. Edwards (Gregory Peck) is not who he thinks he is. He is a man that suffers from amnesia and doesn't remember anything from his past except the fact that he has killed the real Dr. Edwards.

However, Dr.Peterson believes in his innocence and tries to help him. While trying to evade the police, they visit Dr. Peterson's teacher in order for him to help them discover the truth. Has he really killed the real Dr. Edwards? What is the real reason behind his evident guilt complex? And if he hasn't killed Dr. Edwards, who was the killer?

David O.Selznick, the producer, wanted to base this film on his experiences with psychoanalysis. He even brought a real psychoanalyst on set. When he tried to discuss with Alfred Hitchcock how psychoanalysis works, the director told him: "My dear, it's only a movie."

Alfred Hitchcock described the film as "just another manhunt wrapped up in pseudo-psychoanalysis".

Although the film is shot in black and white, two frames where a gun shoots are tinted red.

There is a dream sequence in the film and it is all designed by Salvador Dali. It was originally planned to last 20 minutes more or less but after seeing that a scene couldn't give the proper illusion of perception Hitchcock and Dali, both disappointed, decided to cut it. So the scene lasts approximately two minutes.

The dream sequence was directed by William Cameron Menzies who was disappointed by the result and didn't want to be credited for the filming. After the success of the film, Alfred Hitchcock was really happy to take the credit for himself.

The success of the film allowed Hitchcock to re-hire Ingrid Bergman for his next film, Notorious.

Miklos Rozsa is the composer of the film's beautiful score. It was one of Gregory Peck's most favourite scores and he even used it during his one-man touring lecture show "An evening with Gregory Peck".