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- "Film your murders like love scenes, and film your love scenes like murders", Alfred Hitchcock.
Sir Alfred Hitchcock, the proverbial master of suspense, is generally considered the greatest British director of all time.
Hitch was a small, lonely, fat lad ("I was an uncommonly unattractive young man."), with an absent father and controlling mother, raised in strict catholic home. There is a story that, as a child, he was sent to the local constabulary, with a letter from his father. The policeman read the letter and immediately locked the boy up for ten minutes. After that, the sergeant let young Alfred go, explaining, "This is what happens to people who do bad things." He had a morbid fear of police from that day on. Obviously, such an upbringing would likely precipitate his later preoccupations, and so his neurotic obsessions with guilt, wrongful accusation, lost identity, voyeurism, and the linkage of sex and death formed the themes of his most iconic work.
He started out as an engineering draftsman and designer, which is evident in the visual storytelling techniques he developed ("If it's a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on.") He then got work in the fledgling silent film industry in the UK, with some stops and starts. His first hit was the silent thriller THE LODGER, loosely based on Jack the ripper. His subsequent successes (MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH, 39 STEPS and LADY VANISHES) would catch the attention of Hollywood, and the siren's song would soon call him across the pond.
selection of UK films:
* The Lodger (1927) - silent
* Blackmail (1929) - silent & then released as UK's 1st talkie
* The Man Who Knew too much (1934) - his 1st international hit (better than the subsequent remake)
* 39 Steps (1935) - his first great film
* The Lady Vanishes (1938) - another great early film, got the attention of hollywood
* Jamaica Inn (1939) - a flop, but didn't deter Selznick
Selznick years:
Noted producer David O. Selznick brought Hitch to Hollywood to direct the gothic melodrama REBECCA, to much acclaim and success, but not without tension between the two titanic control freaks. Hitch went on to make a number of successful films during his "selznick years", though some were for other studios to whom Selznick had loaned (i.e., sold) him out. SUSPICION, NOTORIOUS and SHADOW OF A DOUBT are the best thrillers of the period. FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT, SABOTEUR and LIFEBOAT are all solid WWII-themed works, but MR & MRS SMITH is a forgettable romantic comedy, SPELLBOUND is overwrought psychobabble and PARADINE CASE an overlong courtroom drama. Gregory Peck was not one of Hitch's better leading men, as his particular brand of square-jawed heroism lacked the moral ambiguity and sly humor of his more successful colaborations with Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart.
* Rebecca (1940) - Academy Award (Best Picture) for Selznick, not Hitch. ultimately, more a selznick movie than a Hitchcock movie (one of the few Hitch was not involved with the script's development). It has not dated well.
* Foreign Correspondent (1940) (AA nom/picture) - solid WWII anti-nazi agitprop
* Mr. & Mrs. Smith (1941) - minor screwball comedy with Carole Lombarde
* Suspicion (1941) - 1st work as a producer (AA nom/picture), and his first work with Cary Grant; solid, but a sellout ending
* Saboteur (1942) - solid WWII era "wrong man" thriller, ending atop Statue of Liberty (action scenes on iconic monuments a continuing motif)
* Shadow of a Doubt (1943) - Joseph Cotton great as psycho Uncle Charlie... Terrific; hitch's personal fave.
* Lifeboat (1944) (AA nom/director) - solid WWII drama; more theatrical than cinematic (the "single set" limitation is one he'd go back to)
* Spellbound (1945) (AA nom/director, picture) - Gregory Peck, with 1st of hitch's great "cool blondes", Ingrid Bergman, and a Dali dream sequence. Doesn't hold up at all. Freudian subtext becomes text. silly, talky.
* Notorious (1946) - Grant and Bergman are a much better pairing, Rains makes a great Cuckolded villain
* The Paradine Case (1947) - overlong courtroom flop, with Bergman & Peck
1950s-60s
Warners:
After his contract with Selznick expired, Hitchcock produced his next 2, both flops. He expiremented with extended cuts and technicolor in ROPE, loosely based on the Leopold & Loeb thrill killer case, with a miscast Jimmy Stewart as an academic. UNDER CAPRICORN was likely undone not only by its mediocrity but the worldwide scandal that Ingrid Bergman was in the middle of (as she was having an affair, and later a child, with director Roberto Rosellini). The films were released by Warner Bros, and they then produced many of his subsequent films of the period (most of which were not particularly successful). DIAL M was Hitch's first big widescreen effort, in which he used some 3D effects, though the film was not actually released in 3D version until the 1980s. It also featured the 1st work with his new "cool blonde", Grace Kelly.
* Rope (1948) - interesting filmic experiment, but dramatically flawed
* Under Capricorn (1949) - dull flop
* Stage Fright (1950) - Dietrich, minor work
* Strangers on a Train (1951) - the best of this WB period
* I Confess (1953) - Monty Clift as priest; nothing special. Hitch was not a fan of "method actors".
* Dial M for Murder (1954) -first widescreen film (3d in 1980s) and 1st with Grace Kelly; holds up pretty well.
* The Wrong Man (1956) - true story, with Henry Fonda. Its documentary feel undermines dramatic impact.
Paramount:
- "Blondes make the best victims. They're like virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints."
Hitch did 5 films with Paramount, which were all given a theatrical re-release back in the 1980s, before being redistributed to the newly burgeoning home video market. 2 of these were two of his very best films, REAR WINDOW and VERTIGO, both with Jimmy Stewart at his most sexually disturbing and obsessed, verging on sado-masochistic.
* Rear Window (1954) (AA nom/director) - Stewart & Kelly; darkly funny, disturbing rumination on voyeurism
* To Catch a Thief (1955) - Kelly and Grant in light romantic thriller; urbane sophisticated entertainment. Kelly went on to become Princess Grace after the film.
* The Trouble with Harry (1955) - black comedy about a dead body, with a cute young shirley maclaine; silly, pointless.
* The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956) - Doris Day sings "Que Sera, Sera" -- a ridiculous remake.
* Vertigo (1958) - my favorite cool blonde, Kim Novak, totally fetishized by Stewart (and Hitch). One of the greatest films ever made.
* North by Northwest (1959) - Grant and E.M.Saint, "wrong man", black comedy, freudian sexual hysteria, thrilling climax on national monument, the crop duster... its Hitch at his absolute best.
* Psycho (1960) (AA nom/director) - Hitch crossed the line from suspense to pure horror, reinventing the genre and making a fortune for his efforts... he waived his salary to take 60% of net profits when he produced it as an indie (nobody wanted to touch the project), but eventually distributed by Paramount.
Universal:
As host of his longrunning tv anthology series,"Alfred Hitchcock Presents" (1955-65), Hitch became an international celebrity bigger than any of his movies ("I was very pleased that television was now showing murder stories, because it's bringing murder back into its rightful setting - in the home").
During the late 50s, his artistic accomplishments as a flimmaker were finally being recognized in Europe by Truffaut and other french journalists-turned-filmmakers, and he became the darling of the new auteur theorists. But Hitch's health started to deteriorate in the 1960s, and his films for Universal in the mid 60s-70s mark his slow fade.
* The Birds (1963) - Tippi Hedren was his next and last "cool blonde"; still memorable depiction of an avian uprising mysteriously connected to sexual desire. Arguably his last great film.
* Marnie (1964) - Hedren with Sean Connery in a psycho-sexual thriller that harkened back to SPELLBOUND in its freudian obsessions; unsuccessful but some critical views put it in the pantheon of Hitch's best work. I disagree.
* Torn Curtain (1964) - an unsuccessful cold war thriller, this time with Julie Andrews (who was foisted upon him) and Paul Newman, who, as another "method actor", was a problem for Hitch. ("When an actor comes to me and wants to discuss his character, I say, "It's in the script"/ If he says, "But what's my motivation?", I say, "Your salary".)
* Topaz (1969) - another cold war thriller, this one had no stars and flopped
* Frenzy (1972) - hitch went back to the UK, and became more explicit in his depiction of sex and death; some said it was a return to form, others bemoaned its excesses. But he always pushed the boundaries.
* Family Plot (1976) - this goofy black comedy was Hitch's final film and an inauspicious final note.
Never having won an Oscar as a director, Hitch was finally given a lifetime award in 1967 (his speech: "thank you.") In 1979, he was knighted (When asked by a member of the press why, at his advanced age, it took so long for the British government to grant him the title of Knight, he said: "I think it's just a matter of carelessness.") He died shortly thereafter. but his work lives on, not only in film archives, but in the careers of many filmmakers who came after him and were so influenced by his remarkable output.
A baker's dozen to see:
The Man Who Knew too much (1934)
39 Steps (1935)
The Lady Vanishes (1938)
Rebecca (1940)
Shadow of a Doubt(1943)
Notorious (1946)
Strangers on a Train (1951)
Dial M for Murder (1954)
Rear Window (1954)
Vertigo (1958)
North by Northwest (1959)
Psycho (1960)
The Birds (1963)
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