| Double Take | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Johan Grimonprez |
| Produced by | Nicole Gerhards Emmy Oost Hanneke M. van der Tas Denis Vaslin |
| Written by | Johan Grimonprez Tom McCarthy |
| Music by | Christian Halten |
| Cinematography | Martin Testar |
| Editing by | Dieter Diependaele Tyler Hubby |
| Studio | Zap-O-Matik |
| Release date(s) | 10 February 2009 (Berlinale) |
| Running time | 80 minutes |
| Country | Belgium Germany Netherlands |
| Language | English |
Double Take is a 2009 essay film by Belgian director Johan Grimonprez, which intercuts clips and interviews featuring Alfred Hitchcock with archive footage of cold war news coverage, and tells the story of the rise of "fear as a commodity". Impersonating Hitchcock, impressionist Mark Perry narrates a monologue provided by novelist Tom McCarthy describing a fictional meeting between Hitchcock and his double on the 1962 set of The Birds.
Double Take is a Belgian-Dutch-German coproduction. It premiered at the 2009 Berlin Film Festival in the 'Forum expanded' section and was selected for the 2010 Sundance Film Festival in the 'New Frontier' section. Exploring the boundaries of documentary as well as art, the film is most commonly referred to as an essay film.
Double Take is a further development from Grimonprez' short film Looking for Alfred (2005).
The film contains a lot of stock footage, ranging from Alfred Hitchcock's introductory links in the Alfred Hitchcock Presents television series to archival newsreel footage on the Cold War period. The film investigates the theme of "doubles" (a subject often covered in Hitchcock's work) by combining new film material on Ron Burrage, professional Hitchcock double, with a story written by novelist Tom McCarthy, inspired by the short story "25 August 1983" by Jorge Luis Borges.