Turistas (2006)

OH MY FUCKING GOD THE GUY WHO VOICED JOWAN IS the MotW IN THIS EPISODE OF CHARMED. BDHDNDJDJEOBDJEJDIDKFBDIFHHDIDJSJSK

'Turistas' (2006) film

-watched 8/5/2023- 3 stars- Hulu

Desmond Askew, Thomas Newton, Susan Floyd, Miriam Shor and Colin Ferguson in “Then Came You”

top 5 things about Jowan that make you smile

"Send me an ask for my Top 5 anything"

His voice: Apparently I'm in the minority on this but I positively adore Desmond Askew's voice and find it very soothing to listen to. The number one reason I played ESO (aside from hanging out with Daisy) was the fact that he voiced like half the male dunmer

The way he makes fun of the Chantry: Jowan is easy to push around and traumatized as heck, but the biting sarcasm that he reserves for talking about the Chantry is delicious. He's so bitter about his lot in life, but does a good job of hiding it. It only comes out in little bits and pieces with someone he can confide in (like the player). Also his "The sun grows dark, but Lo! Here comes the Dawn" quip always makes me giggle

His potential for growth: even without the companion arc he was intended to have (yes, I will die bitter about this), the way he changes between the Circle and the Arl of Redcliffe is telling. He admits his faults, expresses his regrets about Lily and the player, and offers to make amends. If you send him into the Fade, he resists the demon - proving that he DID have the strength to pass the Harrowing all along. And in the end ... he accepts whatever fate you decide: Death or Tranquility ... his greatest fears and faces them with courage. Of course I would never choose either, so he is either recruited into my party (thank you mods!) or off protecting commoners as an apostate. "Master Levyn" my love

Being a Warden: because if the game won't give me Warden Jowan content, I'll just make it myself! Joining the wardens makes so much sense for him! Blood magic isn't outlawed there ... in fact it's respected and studied. I like to think from time to time about Jowan, a decade or two older, studying Avernus/the Architect (either in person or using their notes) and doing intense research into anatomy, surgery, blood magic, Blight, and the way they all interact to become an INCREDIBLY accomplished physician. Someone who has the respect of his colleagues ... a sense of purpose ... confidence ... yeah ...

His parallels with Morrigan: so I am down bad for Morrigan/Jowan, there is simply no denying it. I like the idea of Morrigan/Amell, and I can see a relationship with Jowan hitting a lot of the same beats. She mocks him, pressures him, scoffs and derides him ... but also takes time to teach him skills that the Circle never would. And although she would never admit it, she eventually opens up to his softness instead of having a knee-jerk reaction to his "weakness". Basically I could see them being really good for each other in the long run and doing a great job raising Keiran together

Clerks #1: "Leonardo Leonardo Returns and Dante Has an Important Decision to Make" | ‎February 20, 2001 (DVD) | Unaired Premiered on Adult Swim November 14, 2008 @ 11:00PM

Clerks began airing on Adult Swim in late 2008. I don't recall it lasting a very long time, but it lasted longer than I remember; they showed it pretty frequently in 2009, taking it on and off the schedule here and there, and then they also aired it in 2010 for one last hurrah.

Clerks was retroactively retitled Clerks: The Animated Series, which makes sense. I still like calling it Clerks for some reason. The show was supposed to air on ABC. Some of it did air on ABC, but most of the episodes made their debut on DVD. They also aired on Comedy Central in 2002. I always remembered this as a Comedy Central acquisition more than an Adult Swim one, personally.

In 2000, I was solidly a Kevin Smith fan. I'm still sheepishly a Kevin Smith fan; It's not that I think he's making good movies, it's just that I feel compelled enough to watch them, which I think is a bare-minimum definition of what a fan is. I was very excited for this show, and I even taped the Super Bowl just to record the one Super Bowl commercial it had. I also made the show appointment viewing for it's two episodes. I was kept abreast of the show's production via various View Askew fan sites and forums I checked regularly. Goddamn, I was a fucking loser.

My Kevin Smith journey was this: was intrigued by Clerks after seeing trailers for it on various non-R-rated movies I rented as a boy. I also recall seeing Siskel and Ebert review it. Was way too young to see it, and I was tad too young for Mallrats, too. But those movies left an impression as I looked up to the Gen-X definition of cool, and aspired to be that thing one day. At the height of my MTV watching, I saw the hour-long Jay & Silent Bob's Secret Video Stash special, where Kevin Smith and company watched goofy 80s videos and made fun of them with his friends, and they played the newly commissioned Jay & Silent Bob MTV promo spots throughout the show. This was the first View Askew production I ever saw. The idea that these guys made movies together and they were all somehow interconnected with one another finally sunk in.

I got my hands on the Jersey trilogy. Beholden to what the handful of video stores had on hand, I remember renting Mallrats first, then Clerks, then Chasing Amy. I spoiled Dogma by reading the screenplay online. Then there was this: A fucking prime time cartoon! Kevin's march towards mainstream legitimacy was progressing nicely. Maybe my mom will become a fan?

As the story goes, the show was considered a disaster by ABC. They only aired two of the six episodes. They didn't air this episode, but they did air the second episode, which heavily references this episode. According to the DVD commentary, the plan was to air this one fifth, which is why there's a text crawl that explains that it's the lost pilot to Clerks, and that there will be a much better episode next week.

This episode isn't all that great; it's one of two that I consider especially weak. The plot is: Leonardo Leonardo (voiced by Alec Baldwin) arrives in town and opens up a new "Quicker Stop" across the street from the Quick Stop. This one does have some funny stuff in it; my favorite gag is Dante and Randal's dedication to The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer, a short-lived (in the real world) sitcom that in the world of Clerks is appointment television and a monster success.

Notable things in this episode include the defanging of Jay and Silent Bob, who now sell fire-crackers. There's also obviously no swearing, but there's some coarse language that wouldn't fly today. Not only do they say "re-re" but they also say "retarded", and "queer" (as a pejorative; one of the weirder instances of a show showing it's age because "that word is actually good now"). There's also one of my favorite gags; the end of the episode has a tacked-on, "Safety tips" segment featuring Jay & Silent Bob. Jay dashes off the line "if Silent Bob could talk, he'd tell you--" right after Silent Bob speaks normally. I loved shit like that.

In general, the sense of humor this show had was very indicative of the sense of humor I had in 2000, and still mostly have today. A lot of the jokes are deconstructive of sitcom humor. The resolution to this episode is vague and absurd, and comes because Dante and Randal copy it from Desmond Pfeiffer. The episode they watch is about a rival opening up a bigger and better "White House of the future" across the street from the white house. I still love that joke!

Sabotage (Alfred Hitchcock, 1936)

Cast:  Sylvia Sidney, Oskar Homolka, Desmond Tester, John Loder, Joyce Barbour, Matthew Bolton, S.J. Warmington, William Dewhurst. Screenplay: Charles Bennett, Ian Hay, Helen Simpson, based on a novel by Joseph Conrad.  Cinematography: Bernard Knowles. Art direction: Oscar Friedrich Werndorff. Film editing: Charles Frend. Music: Herbert Bath, Jack Beaver, Louis Leavy. 

In one of the coldest-hearted scenes ever put on film, a young boy plays with a puppy held by a woman seated next to him on a London bus, and then they are blown to bits by the bomb he has unwittingly been carrying. The scene would be less shocking if we hadn't spent a good part of the movie getting to know Stevie (Desmond Tester), the younger brother of Mrs. Verloc (Sylvia Sidney), whose husband (Oskar Homolka) belongs to a terrorist group. We have seen Stevie carrying his lethal package, which Verloc has commissioned him to leave at a specific location by a certain time, and we have grown fond of him when he is detained by a street hawker selling toothpaste and hair tonic and pauses to watch a parade. As the fatal time grows closer, we feel sure that something will happen to defuse the bomb, as usually happens in movies, so its detonation comes as a reversal of movie convention, one so radical that even Hitchcock will not attempt anything quite like it until he kills off the star of Psycho in mid-film 24 years later. (Even then, he will not do anything so sadistic as add a puppy to the scene.) Sabotage is not one of Hitchcock's more famous movies -- it's often confused with his Saboteur (1942). But it is, I think, one of his most characteristic because of his willingness to violate convention. The film is based on Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent -- a title he couldn't use because it was the title of his other 1936 release, an adaptation of a Somerset Maugham story that starred John Gielgud and Madeleine Carroll. But Sabotage is closer to Kafka than to Conrad, a film that verges on the surreal and dreamlike at times. The Verlocs own a movie theater and their home is separated from it by a passageway behind the screen, so that sometimes the sounds from the movies that are playing enter their daily lives. Stunned by Stevie's death, Mrs. Verloc goes out into the theater, where a Disney short, "Who Killed Cock Robin?" is playing, and suddenly begins laughing at the absurd cartoon action. Much else in the film is similarly askew: The bomb-maker, for example, keeps his explosives in ketchup bottles and condiments jars, and when he goes to get the bomb for Verloc, he finds his granddaughter's doll in the cabinet. (If, indeed, she's his granddaughter -- there's much coy mystery about that.) There's an oddball romance between Mrs. Verloc and Ted (John Loder), the Scotland Yard detective who works undercover at the greengrocers' next to the Verlocs' theater, keeping an eye on Verloc. And the ending is a mare's nest of ambiguities that don't lend themselves to summary. What keeps the movie from descending into incoherence is Hitchcock's sure sense of style and the occasionally expressionistic cinematography of Bernard Knowles. Later, Hitchcock would regret the way he handled Stevie's death, but it remains consistent with the haunting effect of the film as a whole.

gifs from  silverscreendames

Primo Porno (Henry Desmond x Kip Wilson x OC)

Summary: Kip brings home a dirty video and tries to get Dawn and Henry on board, but they have other plans.

Word Count: 1,019

Warnings: Soft smut, threesome, porn video mentions

Kip came bursting through the door of their shared apartment, brandishing a VHS tape. Still dressed as Buffy, his wig was askew, his dress falling off one shoulder, and his left shoe was practically falling off his foot. He was truly a piece of work looking like he was. He stood there panting for a moment, sweat forming at his brow, undoubtedly from racing up here.

"Calm down, Lassie. What is it, girl," Henry deadpanned, causing Dawn to laugh. Kip ripped off his wig with his free hand to cool himself off, and took a couple of extra seconds to catch his breath.

Kip didn’t even try to mock Henry for the lame joke, he was so excited. "I just got us some primo adult entertainment," Kip alluded. Both Henry and Dawn shifted their gaze from Kip to the tape in his hand, piecing it all together.

"You didn’t," Henry accused.

"Kip, isn’t that a little…seedy," Dawn questioned.

"Nah, I mean sure, some is in poor taste, but this is the good stuff. Wanna watch it?" He really was like a dog with a bone over this, and even under the circumstances, Henry found it all a bit amusing. Dawn, however, was a bit more skeptical.

"I assume that is why you bought it," Henry quipped as Kip put his wig in the closet. Kip then made a childish face, sticking his tongue out at Henry as he went over to put the tape in their brand new player. For better or worse, they decided to go along with him, at least for a while.

It started off tame enough. The acting wasn’t stellar, but after having watched a couple of B movies recently, they couldn’t fault it as being all that bad either. The girl was a tall redhead, busty with a small waist, absolute perfection for this kind of role, though personally, she didn’t do anything for Dawn nor Henry. Kip could get excited at a piece of paper if they drew a pair of boobs on it.

The male co-star wasn’t all that much to write home about either. He was fit enough, but too tan, and his oiled up body was unrealistic for coming over to fix a leaky pipe. Not that X-rated movies were meant to be realistic, but still. Trying to ignore what they deemed its obvious flaws, Henry and Dawn patiently awaited things to start heating up, and when they did, they were even less impressed than before. Kip was eating it all up, but Henry wasn’t really feeling it and Dawn had had enough. When it got really graphic, she left the room, locking herself in the bathroom.

Henry noticed her escape immediately. Kip, still engrossed in the tawdry film, had to be elbowed in the side before he realized that Dawn was no longer on the couch with them. "Where’d she go?"

"Bathroom. I really don’t think she’s as into this as you are, Kip."

"You are though, right?" Henry shrugged. It wasn’t like he was disgusted, but it wasn’t doing its job of turning him on either. He much preferred just being with the two of them, no outside stimulation needed.

Kip shut the movie off and went over to the bathroom door. "Dawn? Are you okay?"

"I’m fine," came the muffled response through the door.

"Come out and sit with us," Kip invited. "I turned it off." Kip heard the knob turn and Dawn stepped out. She walked back to the couch and plopped herself on the middle cushion next to Henry. Kip sat on her left.

"I’m sorry I wasn’t into it. It was okay for a while and then I just started comparing myself to that woman and thinking that’s what you wanted from me and I couldn’t take it anymore, Kip."

Kip was shocked. He hadn’t realized it would have that much of an impact on Dawn. "No, I’m sorry. I should have asked. You know I don’t want you any other way than the way you are."

"Neither of us do," Henry supplied. "And to be honest, it wasn’t doing much for me either. I like it when it’s just us."

"I do too," Kip confessed. "I just thought I could spice it up a little. Guess I was wrong."

Dawn shook her head. "You weren’t wrong to try and spice things up," she began.

"Only the way you went about it was wrong," Henry cut in, causing the three of them to laugh, lightening the heavy mood.

"All you really needed to do was ask us how we could spice it up. This…wasn’t it. And that’s okay."

"I’m actually kind of turned on by you still sitting here in that dress," Henry said.

Kip looked down at himself, having completely forgotten he was still wearing the bright pink frock. "You serious?"

"I like it too," Dawn added. "Maybe you can let us help you get the makeup off." To demonstrate what she meant, Dawn leaned over and kissed Kip, transferring some of the light pink gloss on his lips over to hers. Henry was next, taking another layer of pink away from Kip's mouth. And soon they weren’t thinking of the makeup anymore. Or the dirty movie. Just each other.

Clothes finally came off, piling up on the floor beneath them. Fingers trailed over bare skin, causing tickles and laughter, the three of them now fully enjoying one another, their previous worries forgotten. Their moans and sighs mixed together and the teasing never stopped.

Despite a couple awkward positions, they never left the couch when they made love this time, figuring it as good of a place as any in their small apartment. And they remained there after for a time, a mess of tangled limbs, skin pink and sheened with a fine layer of sweat. Dawn rested her head on one side of Kip's chest and Henry rested his on the other. Kip didn’t know what he’d been thinking. Nothing could have improved upon this. This was really primo, and no amount of porn could even come close.

Forever Tag: @arrthurpendragon, @borg-queer, @foxesandmagic, @connietheecunning, @chickensarentcheap

Dawn Martin: @dancingwith-sunflowers, @smutember

CALIFICACIÓN PERSONAL: 8 / 10

Título Original: Jack the Ripper

Año: 1988

Duración: 182 min

País:  Reino Unido  

Dirección: David Wickes

Guion: David Wickes, Derek Marlowe

Música: John Cameron

Fotografía: Alan Hume

Reparto: Michael Caine, Armand Assante, Ray McAnally, Lewis Collins, Ken Bones, Susan George, Jane Seymour, Harry Andrews, Lysette Anthony, Roger Ashton-Griffiths, Peter Armitage, Desmond Askew, Trevor Baxter, Mike Carnell, Ann Castle, Michael Gothard, Hugh Fraser, George Sweeney, Jonathan Moore, Jon Laurimore, Michael Hughes, Richard Morant

Productora: Coproducción Reino Unido-Estados Unidos; Thames Television, Lorimar Television, Euston Films. Emitida por: CBS

Género: Drama; Crime; Mystery

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095388/

TRAILER:

Go

Director Doug Liman Stars Sarah Polley, Katie Holmes, Desmond Askew, Scott Wolf, Jay Mohr USA 1999 Language English 1hr 41mins Colour 

One very messy night out from three (and a bit) angles

For a long time I’ve been arguing that Go should be better remembered, more talked about, as an emblematic late 1990s film, and rewatching hasn’t changed my mind about that. But I will admit my memory had blanked out a third of the movie, and I think that’s interesting, too. 

So, for starters, what is Go? It’s an action comedy told in three parts, each ostensibly (but not strictly) from the point of view of one (or, in last segment, a pair of) character(s). It takes place during roughly a day, a night and the start of the next day in Los Angeles and Las Vegas. It’s a collection of (often fairly wild) misadventures. 

The first and third parts involve a small-time drug deal, initially from the point of view of the seller, teenage supermarket cashier Ronna (Sarah Polley) and then from that of the buyers, TV stars Zack (Scott Wolf) and Adam (Jay Mohr). Also caught up in this: Ronna’s mates/colleagues Claire (Katie Holmes) and Mannie (Nathan Bexton – great value for a part with very few lines), her connection Todd (Timothy Olyphant), cop Burke (William Fichtner) and his wife Irene (Jane Krakowski). Everything about these parts is excellent, as long as you enjoy films in which everything seems to be going wrong.

The middle bit is the one I had completely blanked out. I want to point out that it is well put-together: pacy and sharply timed. It’s just that the whole thing plays like a teenage boy’s fantasy ripped straight from the pages of the then-ascendant lads’ mags, complete with strippers, comedy food poisoning, a car chase etc etc. it takes place, naturally, in Las Vegas.

The scene that sets in train all the other events, the one we see at the start of each segment, has Simon (Desmond Askew) persuading cash-strapped Ronna to take his shift at the supermarket so that he can go to Vegas with his mates. It’s also Simon who Zack and Adam are hoping to score from.

Simon, who is British (not incidental, I’d say), largely floats through the chaos he causes. Yes, there are moments of panic, but he has faith that he will get out of whatever fix he’s gotten into. Askew – who I eventually decided looks almost precisely like Roddy McDowell as a Sex Pistol – embodies this all perfectly. 

Two of his chums (Breckin Meyer as an obnoxious wigga plus random other dude) are utterly superfluous to the plot. I half suspect they are here because otherwise two guys going to Sin City would be overly reminiscent of director Doug Liman’s previous movie, Swingers. 

Simon’s main companion in his adventures is Marcus (Taye Diggs). The friendship of the four is a bit of mystery as Marcus is not only clearly a couple of levels above these dorks both in brains and beauty, he’s well aware of that. So why is he weekending with these losers?

By contrast, all the characters in the first and third stories are relevant, well-drawn and well-cast. The collection of actors assembled was a big selling point at the time, although this is kind of the flip side to Short Term 12 in that most of the cast were at or near the peak of their fame – I guess Timothy Olyphant could be an exception. 

Olyphant, as one of my friends pointed out at the time, is essentially Snake from The Simpsons here. He’s got entertainingly contrasting energy with Katie Holmes. This is probably the best use of Holmes I’ve seen – she doesn’t do anything that different to her other teen-era work, but she fits well into this situation.

You can see why a lot of people in the industry believed Polley had a big future in acting – she chose otherwise. At the time, Scott Wolf was known for playing the most earnest character on the very earnest TV drama Party Of Five, so there was a giggle seeing him here that probably doesn’t carry through time, but he’s good, and Fichtner and Krakowski are very funny.

A note or two about raves on screen and this movie. Firstly, from a British point of view, glow sticks etc seem pretty old hat by this point in time – the so-called summer of rave had been a decade earlier. The notorious rave episode of Inspector Morse – directed by a pre-Trainspotting Danny Boyle, no less – was back in 1992 (rave Columbo, meanwhile, was 2003). And yet, Go is the same year as E’d-up British film Human Traffic, the one with John Simm and a young Danny Dyer. Let me stake clearly that Go is a vastly, vastly better piece of cinema than Human Traffic.

Secondly, Go is a film with a rave in it, not a rave film. By which I mean it takes a cynical view of the subculture and isn’t interested in the notion of collective bliss and so on. Soundtrack-wise and in spirit, what this actually is is the big beat movie. What, you may be asking, was big beat? Big beat was a dance music subgenre that at its most reductive sounded like sped-up hip-hop instrumentals*. Its vibe was jokey and (some critics argued) a bit beery – music you could bounce up and down and shout to, by contrast with the seriousness (proginess, even) of trance. Fatboy Slim – who has indeed has a track on the soundtrack to Go – is the most famous act associated with big beat, although plenty of his work doesn’t actually fit into this category.

Despite my questions about the how well the middle third fits, I still think Go is a terrific movie, sharp and fast and funny. Maybe if the director** or stars had gone on to bigger things, it would be better remembered. 

*Or even sped-up hip-hop full hip-hop tracks, in the case of Fatboy Slim’s pitched-up remix of the Jungle Brothers Because I Got It Like That, which loops the lines ‘I never worked a day in my life/I just lay back and let the big beat lead me’.

**I’ve discussed the curious career of Doug Liman here.

It’s easy to see why this is a cult-classic. It’s a plot-driven and character-driven, and it’s thrilling as hell. MUST WATCH!

Go is a 1999 American crime comedy film written by John August and directed by Doug Liman, with intertwining plots involving three sets of characters, starring William Fichtner, Katie Holmes, Jay Mohr, Sarah Polley, Scott Wolf, Taye Diggs, Breckin Meyer, Timothy Olyphant, Desmond Askew, Jane Krakowski, J. E. Freeman, and Melissa McCarthy.

Go (1999)

ESE: 27/100

50 +10 for Melissa McCarthy’s film debut -10 for convincing your friend to be an accessory to your crime -10 for leaving your other friend in a dangerous situation with a fever and high as fuck +2 for flowery crown thingie -5 for Adam and Zack hitting Ronna with a car -10 for the white boy saying the N-word +5 for Taye Diggs +10 for threesome +10 for titties -10 for playing around with a gun like a total fucking moron -10 for F-slur -10 for car wreck +5 for all the different viewpoints

Then Came You  -  ABC  -  March 22, 2000 - April 26, 2000

Comedy (13 episodes - 7 unaired)

Running Time:  30 minutes

Stars:

Susan Floyd as Billie Thornton

Thomas Newton as Aidan Wheeler

Miriam Shor as Cheryl Sominsky

Desmond Askew as Ed

Colin Ferguson as Lewis Peters

Winston J. Rochas as Manuel

Sylvia Sidney, Desmond Tester, and Oscar Homolka in Sabotage (Alfred Hitchcock, 1936)

Cast: Sylvia Sidney, Oscar Homolka, Desmond Tester, John Loder, Joyce Barbour, Matthew Boulton, S.J. Warmington, William Dewhurst. Screenplay: Charles Bennett, Ian Hay, Helen Simpson, based on a novel by Joseph Conrad. Cinematography: Bernard Knowles. Art direction: Oscar Friedrich Werndorff. Film editing: Charles Frend. Music: Hubert Bath, Jack Beaver, Louis Levy. In one of the coldest-hearted scenes ever put on film, a young boy plays with a puppy held by a woman seated next to him on a London bus, and then they are blown to bits by the bomb he has unwittingly been carrying. The scene would be less shocking if we hadn't spent a good part of the movie getting to know Stevie (Desmond Tester), the younger brother of Mrs. Verloc (Sylvia Sidney), whose husband (Oscar Homolka) belongs to a terrorist group. We have seen Stevie carrying his lethal package, which Verloc has commissioned him to leave at a specific location by a certain time, and we have grown fond of him when he is detained by a street hawker selling toothpaste and hair tonic and pauses to watch a parade. As the fatal time grows closer, we feel sure that something will happen to defuse the bomb, as usually happens in movies, so its detonation comes as a reversal of movie convention, one so radical that even Hitchcock will not attempt anything quite like it until he kills off the star of Psycho in mid-film 24 years later. Even then, he will not do anything so sadistic as add a puppy to the scene. Sabotage is not one of Hitchcock's more famous movies -- it's often confused with his Saboteur (1942). But it is, I think, one of his most characteristic because of his willingness to violate convention. The film is based on Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent -- a title he couldn't use because it was the title of his other 1936 release, an adaptation of a Somerset Maugham story that starred John Gielgud and Madeleine Carroll. But Sabotage is closer to Kafka than to Conrad, a film that verges on the surreal and dreamlike at times. The Verlocs own a movie theater and their home is separated from it by a passageway behind the screen, so that sometimes the sounds from the movies that are playing enter their daily lives. Stunned by Stevie's death, Mrs. Verloc goes out into the theater, where a Disney short, "Who Killed Cock Robin?", is playing, and suddenly begins laughing at the absurd cartoon action. Much else in the film is similarly askew: The bomb-maker, for example, keeps his explosives in ketchup bottles and condiments jars, and when he goes to get the bomb for Verloc, he finds his granddaughter's doll in the cabinet. (If, indeed, she's his granddaughter -- there's much coy mystery about that.) There's an oddball romance between Mrs. Verloc and Ted (John Loder), the Scotland Yard detective who works undercover at the greengrocers' next to the Verlocs' theater, keeping an eye on Verloc. And the ending is a mare's nest of ambiguities that don't lend themselves to summary. What keeps the movie from descending into incoherence is Hitchcock's sure sense of style and the occasionally expressionistic cinematography of Bernard Knowles. Later, Hitchcock would express regret over the way he handled Stevie's death, but it remains consistent with the haunting effect of the film as a whole.