Judy[1] don’t traipse carefully.

Light is green;[1a] from dark
She comes as if from the dead.
By her John’s [2] sparked;
He’s longing to touch
Kim, for whom he’s bought
The couture that is haute.
He’s got conflicted thoughts;
His mind, though, stronger.

[flashback]

Hello, hello
(“Hola”)
Says her spirit in “Vertigo,”
Doña ’lotta,[3]
Her great grandma to whom she can’t say “no.”
John is played for a sucker
By a real heel.[4]

Her story’s full of holes,
But she has hooked this guy
Whose damaged soul
Was injured when he watched
A partner roll
Off a roof; Jim is damned
With acropho’.

Then he finds this sweet
Girl who needs her head checked:
Like John’s, her psyche ails.
She falls and hits the deck.
John gets barbed. . .reclusive;
To Barb,[5] he’s abusive.

[flash forward]

Hello, hello
(“Holy. . . !”)
A spitting-image virgin shows. . .
Doppelgänger.
She grants his sick wish, wears Madeleine [6] clothes.
He knows she gives him something—
It’s a steel feel.

“All of this can be yours,”
He says, fessing, he adores
Her ’cause she’s like gal of yore.
She says, “Not what I want!”
Necrophilia hurts.

Yellow? Hell, no!
That sick light has a verdant glow.
Doubt he’ll bang ’er—
He’s limply down; up can’t go. . .
Then with her, stairs he’s jumping!

It’s revealed: poor schmuck. . .teaching him how
These f**ks had beaten him—wow!
The nun’s soft shrieking. . .Kim down.
The bell peals, peals.

Ding-dong; him, wronged; ding-dong; Kim gone; ding-dong; flick’s strong; ding-dong; Hitch long.[7]


[1]Barton; one of two roles played by Kim Novak
[1a]Color plays a significant role in many Hitchcock films; green and gray figure prominently in this one.
[2]James Stewart as John “Scottie” Ferguson (Rupert Cadell in “Rope,” L.B Jeffries in “Rear Window,” Benjamin McKenna in the remake of “The Man Who Knew Too Much”)
[3]Carlotta Valdes (too convoluted to explain)
[4]Gavin Elster, as played by Tom Helmore. Elster hires Judy to play his wife, Madeleine, and lure Ferguson, who has fallen for her (so to speak), to the San Juan Bautista mission. Ferguson, a cop, has acrophobia, developed when he and another cop were chasing a guy on a roof. The other cop fell to his death after trying to save Ferguson, who was hanging from a rain gutter (similar scenes occur in “North by Northwest,” “To Catch a Thief,” and “Saboteur”). So he can’t follow Judy up the tower, where Elster waits with his wife’s dead body, dressed in the same outfit as Judy. Elster throws the body off the tower. Ferguson goes into a depression. Later Ferguson encounters Judy, working as a salesgirl, and tries to turn her into “Madeleine” by dressing her as Madeleine had. He learns of the ruse and takes Judy to the mission. This time he is able to climb (hello, Dr. Freud) and he drags Judy up with him. They are startled by a nun, and Judy falls to her death. “Elster” is German for “magpie” (what could “jay,” eh, be? “Eichelhäner”). Birds are a leitmotif in some films. Aside from the obvious (“The Birds,” Norman Bates’ stuffed birds), the name of the character Captain Melbeck in “Suspicion” is a variation on “Malbec,” “evil beak.”
[5]Barbara Bel Geddes as Midge Wood (four roles in “Alfred Hitchcock Presents”), who has the unrequited hots for Ferguson.
[6]Elster; Novak’s other role
[7]At 128 minutes, this is one of Hitchcock’s longer works; “Topaz” tops, I believe, at 143