STORY STUDY - MEDIUM: FILM “High Anxiety”

With a place called the Psycho-Neurotic Institute for the Very, Very Nervous, there shouldn’t be that much shady things going on behind the walls, right?

Directed by Mel Brooks, and written by Brooks, Ron Clark, Rudy De Luca, and Barry Levinson, High Anxiety is the story of Dr. Richard Thorndyke who is the new replacement doctor at a mental institute.

Unbeknownst to him, there is a conspiracy going on involving the staff of the institute exaggerating the illnesses of their patients so they can continue earning money from their rich families.

The only allies Thorndyke has are his driver, and a woman whose father is one of the trapped mental patients.

Based on the movie poster, and a lot of the scenes it parodies, the film is a satire of Alfred Hitchcock’s films. There are references to Psycho, Vertigo, and The Birds, to name a few. Even the term “MacGuffin” is used in a clever way to move the plot forward, or in this case, making the character’s journey a frustrating one.

It’s best not to think too hard about the story. It’s very basic Hitchcock, with a conspiracy going on for the main character that has no experience with mystery solving to solve.

If you ever find yourself asking “What the Hell?” when certain scenes and character moments happen, that’s because the film is that surreal and confusing. There is no purpose to why that element exists outside of shock humor.

The best moments of comedy, or at least my favorite, are when the fourth wall is broken in terms of the physics of how film language works. There’s a scene when the camera is about to zoom into a dining room, but it crashes into the glass door, shattering it. It comes out of nowhere if you have no idea what Mel Brooks is about.

I came across the film when watching it on TV. It was a Mel Brooks film that I had no idea existed. Looking at Brooks’ filmography of his iconic films, it’s certainly the most underrated/understated, probably because the other ones are more iconic or the most quotable.

Admittedly, High Anxiety is neither of those. However, I think it worked to its advantage because I had no expectations for this, which made the comedy in the scenes that much funnier for me. I never saw it coming. There’s a love for Hitchcock in this, and it shows.