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This article or section relies largely or entirely upon a single source. Please help improve this article by introducing appropriate citations of additional sources. |
| Alfred Hitchcock | |||||||||||||||
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| Born | Alfred Joseph Hitchcock August 13 1899 Leytonstone, London | ||||||||||||||
| Died | April 29 1980 (aged 80) Bel Air, Los Angeles | ||||||||||||||
| Other name(s) | Hitch The Master of Suspense | ||||||||||||||
| Years active | 1921–1976 | ||||||||||||||
| Spouse(s) | Alma Reville (1926-1980) | ||||||||||||||
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Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock KBE (August 13 1899 – April 29 1980)"Senses of Cinema-Great Directors - Alfred Hitchcock – Master of Paradox. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. was an iconic and highly influential director and producer who pioneered many techniques in the suspense and thriller genres.
After a substantial film career in his native Britain, he moved to Hollywood and became an American citizen with dual nationality in 1956, thus he also remained a British subject.
Hitchcock directed more than fifty feature films in a career spanning six decades, from the silent film era, through the invention of talkies, to the colour era.
He was among the most consistently recognizable directors to the general public, and was one of the most successful film directors during his lifetime. He continues to be one of the best known and most popular filmmakers of all time.
Hitchcock became famous for his expert and largely unrivalled control of pace and suspense, and his films draw heavily on both fear and fantasy. The films are known for their droll humour and witticisms, and these cinematic works often portray innocent people caught up in circumstances beyond their control or understanding.
Hitchcock began his directing career in the United Kingdom in 1922. From 1939 onward, he worked primarily in the United States. In September, 1940, Hitchcock had purchased a 200-acre (0.81 km²) mountaintop estateMarion Dale Pokriots. Women of the Rancho. Scotts Valley Chamber of Commerce. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. for the sum of $40,000.Local Inspiration for Movie Classics: Hitchcock had Link to Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz Putlic Libraries, Ca.. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. Known as the 1870 Cornwall RanchAlfred Hitchcock Appreciation Society. virb.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. or "Heart o\' the Mountain" which was located at the end of Canham Road. The Ranch was perched high above Scotts Valley, California, and the Hitchcocks resided there from 1940 to 1972. The Hitchcocks became close friends with the parents of Joan Fontaine, after she had starred in his film, Rebecca. Years later, after a break-in at his estate, Hitchcock had replaced all of the accumulated paintings with studio-made copies, and the family had sold the estate in 1974, six years before Hitchcock\'s death.
Hitchcock and family had also purchased a second home in late 1942 at 10957 Bellagio Road10957 Bellagio Road Alfred Hitchcock\'s home. On this very spotDOTcom. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. in Los Angeles, just across from the Bel Air Country Club.Bel Air Country Club. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. Hitchcock died of renal failure in 1980.Patrick McGilligan, Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light (New York: HarperCollins, 2003)
RebeccaRebecca (1940). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. was the only one of his films to win the Academy Award for Best PictureAwards for \'Rebecca\' 1940. IMDb.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-04., although four other films were also nominated. Hitchcock had never won an Academy Award for Best Director. He was, however, awarded the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial AwardIrving G. Thalberg Memorial Award. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. for lifetime achievement in 1967.
Alfred Hitchcock was born on August 13, 1899, in Leytonstone, London, the second son and youngest of three children of William Hitchcock (1862-1914), a greengrocer and poulterer, and his wife, Emma Jane Hitchcock (née Whelan; 1863-1942). His family was mostly Roman Catholic, being of Irish extraction.Patrick McGilligan, pg. 7 Hitchcock was sent to the Jesuit Classic school St. Ignatius College in Enfield, London.Welcome to St Ignatius College. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. He often described his childhood as being very lonely and sheltered, which was compounded by his weight issues.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 18-19
It is widely known that as a child, Hitchcock\'s father once sent him to their local police station with a note asking the officer to lock him away for ten minutes as punishment for behaving badly.Hollywood in the Hills. Sentinel Staff Report (July 24, 2005). Retrieved on 2008-03-05. This idea of being harshly treated or wrongfully accused is more than commonly reflected in Hitchcock\'s films.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 7-8
His mother would often make him address her while standing at the foot of her bed, especially if he behaved badly, forcing him to stand there for hours. These experiences of Hitchcock would later be used for the portrayal of the character of Norman Bates in his movie Psycho.Psycho (1960). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05.Patrick McGilligan, pg. 9
Hitchcock\'s father died when he was 14. In the same year, he had left the Jesuit-run St Ignatius\' College in Stamford Hill, his school at the time, to study at the School for Engineering and Navigation. After graduating, he became a draftsman and advertising designer with a cable company.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 24-25
During this period, Hitchcock became intrigued by photography and started working in film production in London, working as a title-card designer for the London branch of what would become Paramount Pictures. In 1920, he had received a full-time position at Islington Studios with its American owner, Famous Players-Lasky and their British successor, Gainsborough Pictures,Gainsborough Pictures (1924-51). British Film Institute ScreenOnline. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. designing the titles for silent movies.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 46-51
In 1925, Michael BalconBalcon, Michael (1896-1977) Executive Producer. British Film Institute ScreenOnline. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. of Gainsborough Pictures gave Hitchcock an opportunity to direct his first film, The Pleasure GardenThe Pleasure Garden (1925). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. made at Ufa studiosStudio Babelsberg makes comeback. The Hollywood Reporter (February 8, 2008). Retrieved on 2008-03-06. in Germany. The commercial failure of this film threatened to derail his promising career.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 68-71 Hitchcock rebounded in 1926 and made his debut in the thriller genre with the film, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog.The Lodger (1927). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. The film was a major commercial and critical success when it was released in January 1927 throughout the United Kingdom. As with many of his earlier works, this film was influenced by Expressionist techniques that Hitchcock had witnessed first-hand in Germany. This film was the first truly "Hitchcockian"Hitchcockian Stuff. Alfredsplace.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-06.Ask the Critic-The Hitch Is Back-What, exactly, makes a film Hitchcockian.. Entertainment Weekly (EW.COM). Retrieved on 2008-03-06. film, incorporating such themes as the "wrong man".Patrick McGilligan, pg. 85
Following the success of The Lodger, Hitchcock began initial efforts to promote himself in the media, and hired a publicist to imbue his growing reputation as one of the British film industry\'s rising stars. On December 2, 1926, Hitchcock married his assistant director, Alma Reville at the Brompton Oratory. Their first child, daughter Patricia, was born in 1928. Alma was to become Hitchcock\'s closest collaborator. She wrote some of his screenplays and (though often uncredited) worked with him on every one of his films.
In 1929, he began work on his tenth film Blackmail.Blackmail (1929). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. While the film was still in production, the studio decided to make it one of Britain\'s first sound pictures. With the climax of the film taking place on the dome of the British Museum, Blackmail began the Hitchcock tradition of using famous landmarks as a backdrop for suspense sequences. In the PBS series The Men Who Made The Movies,American Masters-Alfred Hitchcock. Public Broadcasting System. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. Hitchcock had explained how he used early sound recording as a special element of the film, emphasizing the word "knife" in a conversation with the woman suspected of murder.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 120-123
In 1933, Hitchcock was once again working for Michael Balcon at Gaumont-British Picture Corporation.Gaumont-British Picture Corporation. British Film Institute. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. His first film for the company, The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934),The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. was a success and his second, The 39 Steps (1935),The 39 Steps (1935). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. is often considered one of the best films from his early period. This film was also one of the first to introduce the concept of the "Macguffin", a plot device around which a whole story seems to revolve, but ultimately has nothing to do with the true meaning or ending of the story. In The 39 Steps, the Macguffin is a stolen set of blueprints. (Hitchcock told French director François Truffaut: "There are two men sitting in a train going to Scotland and one man says to the other, \'Excuse me, sir, but what is that strange parcel you have on the luggage rack above you?\' \'Oh,\' says the other, \'that\'s a Macguffin.\' \'Well,\' says the first man, \'what\'s a Macguffin?\' The other answers, \'It\'s an apparatus for trapping lions in the Scottish Highlands.\' \'But,\' says the first man, \'there are no lions in the Scottish Highlands.\' \'Well,\' says the other, \'then that\'s no Macguffin.\'")Patrick McGilligan, pg. 158
Hitchcock\'s next major success was in 1938 with his film The Lady Vanishes,The Lady Vanishes (1938). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. a clever and fast-paced film about the search for a kindly old Englishwoman (Dame May Whitty),Dame May Whitty. Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. who disappears while onboard a train in the fictional country of Vandrika (a thinly-veiled version of Nazi Germany).Lions of British Cinema-Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, (August 13, 1899 – April 29, 1980). AvantGardeNow.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-06.
By 1938, Hitchcock had become known for his famous observation, "Actors are cattle."Alfred Hitchcock Quotes. Brainy Quote. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. He once said that he first made this remark as early as the late 1920s, when he thought about stage actors who were snobbish about motion pictures. However, Michael Redgrave said that Hitchcock had made the statement during the filming of The Lady Vanishes. The phrase would haunt Hitchcock for years to come and would result in a funny incident during the filming of his 1941 production of Mr. & Mrs. Smith, when Carole Lombard brought some heifers onto the set to surprise the director.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 210-211, 277; American Movie Classics
At the end of the 1930\'s, Hitchcock was at the zenith of his artistic talents, and he was in a position to negotiate his own career options when David O. Selznick managed to entice him to Hollywood.
The suspense and the gallows humour that had become Hitchcock\'s trademark in film had continued to appear in his productions. The working arrangements with Selznick, however, were less than optimal. Selznick suffered from perennial money problems, and Hitchcock was often displeased with Selznick\'s creative control over his films. Consequently, Selznick ended up "loaning" Hitchcock to the larger studios more often than producing Hitchcock\'s films himself. In addition, Selznick, as well as fellow independent producer Samuel Goldwyn, made only a few films each year, so Selznick did not always have projects for Hitchcock to direct. Remarkably, Goldwyn had also negotiated with Hitchcock on a possible contract, only to be outbid by Selznick. Hitchcock was quickly impressed with the superior resources of the American studios compared to the financial restrictions he had frequently encountered in England. Nevertheless, Hitchcock\'s fondness for his homeland resulted in numerous American films set in, or filmed in, the United Kingdom, right up to his next-to-last film, Frenzy.Frenzy (1972). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07.
With the prestigious Selznick picture Rebecca in 1940, Hitchcock made his first American movie, although it was set in England and based on a novel by English author Daphne du Maurier and starred Sir Laurence Olivier and Joan Fontaine. This Gothic melodrama explores the fears of a naïve young bride who enters a great English country home and must grapple with the problems of a distant husband, a predatory housekeeper, and the legacy of her husband\'s late wife, the beautiful, mysterious Rebecca. The film won the Academy Award for Best Picture of 1940. However, the statuette went to Selznick as the film\'s producer,Awards for Rebecca (1940). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. and the film failed to win the Best Director award for Hitchcock.
There were additional problems between Selznick and Hitchcock. Selznick was known to impose very restrictive rules upon Hitchcock, thereby hindering his creative control. Hitchcock was then forced to shoot the film as Selznick had wanted, immediately creating friction within their relationship. At the same time, Selznick complained about Hitchcock\'s "goddamn jigsaw cutting," which meant that the producer did not have nearly the leeway to create his own film as he liked, but had to follow Hitchcock\'s vision of the finished product.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 251-252 The film was the third longest of Hitchcock\'s films at 130 minutes, exceeded only by The Paradine Case at 132 minutes and North by NorthwestNorth by Northwest (1959). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. at 136 minutes.Patrick McGilligan, pg. 253
Hitchcock\'s second American film, the European-set thriller Foreign CorrespondentForeign Correspondent (1940). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. (originally titled Personal History), was also nominated for Best Picture during that year. The movie was filmed in the first year of World War II and was inspired by the rapidly-changing events in Europe, as fictionally-covered by an American newspaper reporter portrayed by a wise-cracking Joel McCrea. The film cleverly used actual footage of European scenes and scenes filmed on a Hollywood backlot. Curiously, because of Hollywood\'s Production Code censorship, the film avoided direct references to Germany and Germans.Patrick McGilligan, pg. 244
Hitchcock\'s films during the 1940s were diverse. The movies ranged from the romantic comedy Mr. & Mrs. Smith (1941) and the courtroom drama The Paradine Case (1947),The Paradine Case (1947). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. to the dark and disturbing Shadow of a Doubt (1943).Shadow of a Doubt (1943). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05.
Suspicion (1941)Suspicion (1941). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. marked Hitchcock\'s first film as a producer as well as director. Hitchcock had used the north coast of Santa Cruz for the English coastline sequence. This film was to be actor Cary Grant\'s first time working with Hitchcock, and it was one of the few times that Grant would be cast in a sinister role. Joan FontaineJoan Fontaine. Hollywood.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. won Best Actress Oscar and New York Film Critics Circle AwardNew York Film Critics Circle Winners In the 40\'s. Geocities. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. for her outstanding performance in Suspicion.
Saboteur (1942)Saboteur (1942). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. was the first of two films that Hitchcock made for Universal, a studio where he would continue his career during his later years. Hitchcock was then forced to utilize Universal contract players Robert Cummings and Priscilla Lane, both known for their work in comedies and light dramas. Hitchcock made the most of the situation and had received remarkably good performances from the two lead actors. Breaking with Hollywood conventions of the time, Hitchcock did extensive location filming, especially in New York City, and memorably depicted a confrontation between a suspected saboteur (Cummings) and a real saboteur (Norman Lloyd) atop the Statue of Liberty.
Shadow of a Doubt (1943), his personal favourite of all his films and the second of the early Universal films, was about young Charlotte "Charlie" Newton (Teresa Wright), who suspects her beloved uncle Charlie Oakley (Joseph Cotten) of being a serial murderer. In its use of overlapping characters, dialogue, and closeups it has provided a generation of film theorists with psychoanalytic potential, including Jacques Lacan and Slavoj Žižek. The film also harkens back to one of Cotten\'s best known films, Citizen Kane.Citizen Kane (1941). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. Hitchcock again filmed extensively on location, this time in the Northern California city of Santa Rosa, during the summer of 1942. The director showcased his own personal fascination with crime and criminals when he had two of his characters discuss various ways of killing people, to the obvious annoyance of Charlotte.
Working at 20th Century Fox, Hitchcock had adapted a script of John Steinbeck\'s that had chronicled the experiences of the survivors of a German U-boat attack in the film Lifeboat (1944).Lifeboat (1944). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. Since the action sequences were confined to the small boat, the film was clearly the most confined of Hitchcock\'s films. While at Fox, Hitchcock seriously considered directing the film version of A.J. Cronin\'s novel about a Catholic priest in China, The Keys of the Kingdom,The Keys of the Kingdom (1944). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. but the plans for this fell through. John M. Stahl ended up directing the 1944 film, which was produced by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and starred Gregory Peck, among other luminaries.Patrick McGilligan, pg. 343
Returning to England for an extended visit in late 1943 and early 1944, Hitchcock filmed two short films for the Ministry of Information, Bon VoyageBon Voyage (1944). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. and Aventure Malgache.Aventure malgache (1944). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. The films were made for France\'s free territories and were the only ones Hitchcock made in French; they feature typical Hitchcockian touches.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 346-348 In the 1990s, the two films were shown by Turner Classic Movies and released on home video.
In 1945, Hitchcock served as "treatment advisor" (in effect, a film-editor) for a Holocaust documentary produced by the British Army. The film, which recorded the liberation of Concentration Camps, remained unreleased until 1985, when it was completed by PBS Frontline and distributed under the title Memory of the Camps.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 372-374FRONTLINE: "Memory of the Camps". Public Broadcasting System (PBS). Retrieved on 2008-03-07.
Hitchcock again worked for Selznick when he had directed Spellbound,Spellbound (1945). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. which explored the then-fashionable subject of psychoanalysis and featured a dream sequence designed by Salvador Dalí. The dream sequence as it actually appears in the film is considerably shorter than was originally envisioned, which was to be several minutes long, because it proved to be too disturbing for the audience. Some of the memorable and original musical score by Miklos Rozsa was later adapted by the composer into a concert piano concerto.
Notorious (1946)Notorious (1946). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. followed Spellbound. As Selznick failed to see its potential, he allowed Hitchcock to make the film for RKO. From this point onwards, Hitchcock would produce his own films, giving him a far greater degree of freedom to pursue the projects that interested him. Notorious starred Hitchcock regulars Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant and features a plot about Nazis, uranium, and South America. It was a huge box office success and has remained one of Hitchcock\'s most acclaimed films. His use of uranium as a plot device briefly led to Hitchcock\'s being under surveillance by the FBI. McGilligan wrote that Hitchcock consulted scientists about the development of an atomic bomb; Selznick complained that the notion was "science fiction," only to be confronted by the news stories of the detonation of two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan during 1945. These bombings had led to the end of World War II.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 366-381
After completing his final film for Selznick, The Paradine Case (a promising courtroom drama that critics found lost momentum because it apparently ran too long and exhausted its resource of ideas), Hitchcock filmed his first color film, Rope,Rope (1948). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. which appeared in 1948. Here Hitchcock experimented with marshalling suspense in a confined environment, as he had done earlier with Lifeboat (1943). He also experimented with exceptionally long takes — up to ten minutes long (see Themes and devices). Featuring James Stewart in the leading role, Rope was the first of four films Stewart would make for Hitchcock. It was based on the Leopold and Loeb case of the 1920s. Somehow Hitchcock\'s cameraman managed to move the bulky, heavy Technicolor camera quickly around the set as it followed the continuous action of the long takes.
Under Capricorn (1949),Under Capricorn (1949). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. set in nineteenth-century Australia, also used the short-lived technique of long takes, but to a more limited extent. He again used Technicolor in this production, then returned to black and white films for several years. For Rope and Under Capricorn Hitchcock formed a production company with Sidney Bernstein, called Transatlantic Pictures, which became inactive after these two unsuccessful pictures. Hitchcock continued to produce his films for the rest of his life.
In 1950, Hitchcock filmed Stage Fright on location in the U.K. For the first time, Hitchcock matched one of Warner Brothers\'Warner Brothers Studios. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. biggest stars, Jane Wyman, with the sultry German actress Marlene Dietrich. Dietrich\'s daughter later wrote that Dietrich detested Wyman, although Wyman had just won the Best Actress Oscar for Johnny Belinda. Hitchcock may have exploited the offscreen animosity between Wyman and Dietrich in this offbeat, behind-the-scenes glimpse of London theatrical personalities, one of whom commits a murder. Hitchcock utilized a number of prominent British actors, including Michael Wilding, Richard Todd, and Alastair Sim. This was Hitchcock\'s first production for Warner Brothers, which had distributed Rope and Under Capricorn, because Transatlantic Pictures was experiencing financial difficulties.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 429, 774-775
With the film, Strangers on a Train (1951),Strangers on a Train (1951). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith, Hitchcock combined many of the best elements from his preceding British and American films. Two men casually meet and speculate on removing people who are causing them difficulty. One of the men, though, takes this banter entirely seriously. With Farley Granger reprising some elements of his role from Rope, Strangers continued the director\'s interest in the narrative possibilities of blackmail and murder.
MCA head Lew Wasserman, whose client list included James Stewart, Janet Leigh, and other actors who would appear in Hitchcock\'s films, had a significant impact in packaging and marketing Hitchcock\'s films beginning in the 1950s. With Wasserman\'s help, Hitchcock received tremendous creative freedom from the studios, as well as substantive financial rewards as a result of Paramount\'s profit-sharing contract.
Three very popular films starring Grace Kelly followed. Dial M for Murder (1954) was adapted from the popular stage play by Frederick Knott. This was originally another experimental film, with Hitchcock using the technique of 3D cinematography, although the film was not released in this format at first; it did receive screenings in the early 1980s in 3D form. The film also marked a return to Technicolor productions for Hitchcock. Hitchcock moved to Paramount Pictures and filmed Rear Window,Rear Window (1954). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. starring James Stewart and Kelly again, as well as Thelma Ritter and Raymond Burr. Here, the wheelchair-bound Stewart observes the movements of his neighbours across the courtyard and becomes convinced one of them has murdered his wife. Like Lifeboat and Rope, the movie was photographed almost entirely within the confines of a small space: Stewart\'s tiny studio apartment overlooking the massive courtyard set. To Catch a Thief, set in the French Riviera, starred Kelly and Cary Grant. It proved to be Hitchcock\'s last film with Kelly because she married Prince Rainier of Monaco in 1956 and the residents of her new homeland refused to allow her to make any more films.
The remake of his own 1934 film The Man Who Knew Too MuchThe Man Who Knew Too Much (1956). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. in 1956 followed, this time starring James Stewart and Doris Day, who sang the theme song, "Whatever Will Be, Will Be (Que Sera, Sera)" (which won the Oscar for "Best Music"Awards for "The Man Who Knew Too Much" (1956). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04., and became a big hit for Day).
The Wrong Man (1957),The Wrong Man (1956). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. Hitchcock\'s final film for Warner Brothers, was a low-key black and white production based on a real-life case of mistaken identity. This was the only film of Hitchcock\'s to star Henry Fonda.
Vertigo (1958)Vertigo (1958). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. again starred Stewart, this time with Kim Novak and Barbara Bel Geddes. The film was a commercial failure, but has come to be viewed by many as one of Hitchcock\'s masterpieces; it is now placed highly in the Sight & Sound decade polls. It was premiered in the San Sebastian International Film Festival,Donostia Zinemaldia Festival de San Sebastian International Film Festival. Retrieved on 2008-03-06.San Sebastián Film Festival (1958). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. where Hitchcock won a Silver Seashell.
By this time, Hitchcock had filmed in many areas of the United States.Hitchcock\'s America Lifelong Learning Institute-Fall 2001. Sonoma State University. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. He followed Vertigo with three more successful films. All are also recognized as among his very best films: North by Northwest (1959), Psycho (1960), and The Birds (1963).The Birds (1963). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. The latter two films were particularly notable for their unconventional soundtracks, both orchestrated by Bernard Herrmann: the screeching strings played in the murder scene in Psycho exceeded the limits of the time, and The Birds dispensed completely with conventional instruments, instead using an electronically-produced soundtrack and an unaccompanied song by school children (just prior to the infamous attack at the historic Bodega Bay School).Schoolhouse last roost for \'The Birds\'; Museum among few Bodega sites left from Hitchcock film. SFGate.com. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. Also notable was that Santa Cruz was mentioned again as the place where the bird-phenomenon was said to have first occurred. These films are considered his last great films, after which his career started to lose pace (although some critics such as Robin Wood and Donald Spoto contend that Marnie,Marnie (1964). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. from 1964, is first-class Hitchcock, and some have argued that Frenzy is unfairly overlooked).
Failing health took its toll on Hitchcock, reducing his new film production during the last two decades of his life. Hitchcock had filmed two spy thrillers, Torn CurtainTorn Curtain (1966). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. with Paul Newman and Julie Andrews and TopazTopaz (1969). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. (based on a Leon Uris novel), which both received mixed reviews. In 1972, Hitchcock returned to London to film Frenzy, his last major success. For the first time, Hitchcock allowed nudity and profane language, which had before been taboo, in one of his films. Biographers have noted that Hitchcock had always pushed the limits of film censorship, often managing to fool Joseph Breen, the longtime head of Hollywood\'s Production Code. Many times Hitchcock slipped in subtle hints of improprieties forbidden by censorship until the mid-1960s. Yet Patrick McGilligan wrote that Breen and others often realized that Hitchcock was inserting such things and were actually amused as well as alarmed by Hitchcock\'s "inescapable inferences."Patrick McGilligan, pg. 249 Beginning with Torn Curtain, Hitchcock was finally able to blatantly include plot elements previously forbidden in American films and this continued for the remainder of his film career.
Family Plot (1976)Family Plot (1976). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-07. was his last film. It related the escapades of "Madam" Blanche Tyler played by Barbara Harris, a fraudulent spiritualist, and her taxi driver lover Bruce Dern making a living from her phony powers. William Devane, Karen Black and Cathleen Nesbitt co-starred. It was the only Hitchcock film scored by John Williams.
When Hitchcock saw the Mel Brooks 1977 comedy-spoof of his work, High Anxiety, he enjoyed it, but Brooks initially feared that Hitchcock was not pleased because he walked out of the movie when it was over.Trivia for High Anxiety (1977). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. Days later, Brooks fear proved untrue as Hitchcock had sent Brooks a bottle of champagne.
Near the end of his life, Hitchcock had worked on the script for a projected spy thriller, The Short Night, collaborating with screenwriters James Costigan and Ernest Lehman. Despite some preliminary work, the story was never filmed. This was due, primarily, to Hitchcock\'s own failing health and his concerns over the health of his wife, Alma, who had suffered a stroke. The script was eventually published posthumously, in a book on Hitchcock\'s last years.Patrick McGilligan, pgs. 731-734 Freeman, David (1999). The Last Days of Alfred Hitchcock. Overlook. ISBN 087951728X.
Hitchcock was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II in the 1980 New Year\'s Honours. He was entitled to use the title "Sir" because he remained a British subject when he adopted American citizenship in 1956. He died just four months later, on April 29, before he received the opportunity to be formally invested by the Queen.
Alfred Hitchcock died from renal failure in his Bel-Air, Los Angeles home at the age of 80. His wife Alma Reville, and their daughter, Patricia Hitchcock O\'Connell, both survived him.
A funeral service was held at Good Shepherd Catholic ChurchGood Shepherd Catholic Church Beverly Hills, CA 90210. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. in Beverly Hills. His body was cremated and his ashes were scattered over the Pacific."Alfred Hitchcock Dies; A Master of Suspense; Alfred Hitchcock, Master of Suspense and Celebrated Film Director, Dies at 80 Increasingly Pessimistic Sought Exotic Settings Technical Challenges Became a Draftsman Lured to Hollywood", The New York Times, April 30, 1980, Wednesday. Retrieved on 2007-08-21. Alfred Hitchcock Dies; A Master of Suspense; Alfred Hitchcock, Master of Suspense and Celebrated Film Director, Dies at 80 Increasingly Pessimistic Sought Exotic Settings Technical Challenges Became a Draftsman Lured to Hollywood. The New York Times (Wednesday, April 30, 1980). Retrieved on 2008-03-07.
Please see the article: Themes and plot devices in the films of Alfred Hitchcock
Many of Hitchcock\'s films contain cameo appearances by Hitchcock himself: the director would be seen for a brief moment boarding a bus, crossing in front of a building, standing in an apartment across the courtyard, or appearing in a photograph. This playful gesture became one of Hitchcock\'s signatures. As a recurring theme he would carry a musical instrument — especially memorable was the large double bass case that he wrestles onto the train at the beginning of Strangers on a Train.
In his earliest appearances he would fill in as an obscure extra, standing in a crowd or walking through a scene in a long camera shot (e.g. in his 1927 film The Lodger). But he became more prominent in his later appearances, as when he turns to see Jane Wyman\'s disguise when she passes him on the street in Stage Fright, and in stark silhouette in his final film Family Plot (1976).
Hitchcock seemed to delight in the technical challenges of filmmaking. In the film Lifeboat, Hitchcock stages the entire action of the movie in a small boat, yet manages to keep the cinematography from monotonous repetition (his trademark cameo appearance was a dilemma, given the limitations of the setting; so Hitchcock appears in a fictitious newspaper ad for a weight loss product). Similarly, the entire action in Rear Window either takes place or is seen from a single apartment.
In Spellbound, two unprecedented point-of-view shots were achieved by constructing a large wooden hand (which would appear to belong to the character whose point of view the camera took) and outsized props for it to hold: a bucket-sized glass of milk and a large wooden gun. For added novelty and impact, the climactic gunshot was hand-coloured red on some copies of the black-and-white print of the film.
Rope (1948) was another technical challenge: a film that appears to have been shot entirely in a single take. The film was actually shot in 10 takes of ranging from four and half to 10 minutes each, 10 minutes being the maximum amount of film that would fit in a single camera reel; some transitions between reels were hidden by having a dark object fill the entire screen for a moment. Hitchcock used those points to hide the cut, and began the next take with the camera in the same place.
His 1958 film Vertigo contains a camera technique that has been imitated and re-used many times by filmmakers, it has become known as the Hitchcock zoom.
Hitchcock\'s films sometimes feature characters struggling in their relationships with their mothers. In North by Northwest (1959), Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant\'s character) is an innocent man ridiculed by his mother for insisting that shadowy, murderous men are after him (in this case, they are). In The Birds (1963), the Rod Taylor character, an innocent man, finds his world under attack by vicious birds, and struggles to free himself of a clinging mother (Jessica Tandy). The killer in Frenzy (1972) has a loathing of women but idolizes his mother. The villain Bruno in Strangers on a Train hates his father, but has an incredibly close relationship with his mother (played by Marion Lorne). Sebastian (Claude Rains) in Notorious has a clearly conflictual relationship with his mother, who is (correctly) suspicious of his new bride Alicia Huberman (Ingrid Bergman). And, of course, Norman Bates\' troubles with his mother in Psycho are infamous.
Hitchcock heroines tend to be lovely, cool blondes who seem proper at first but, when aroused by passion or danger, respond in a more sensual, animal, or even criminal way. As noted, the famous victims in The Lodger are all blondes. In The 39 Steps, Hitchcock\'s glamorous blonde star, Madeleine Carroll, is put in handcuffs. In Marnie (1964), the title character (played by Tippi Hedren) is a kleptomaniac. In To Catch a Thief (1955), Francie (Grace Kelly) offers to help a man she believes is a cat burglar. In Rear Window, Lisa (Grace Kelly again) risks her life by breaking into Lars Thorwald\'s apartment. And, most notoriously, in Psycho, Janet Leigh\'s unfortunate character steals $40,000 and is murdered by a reclusive lunatic. Hitchcock\'s last blonde heroine was - years after Dany Robin and her "daughter" Claude Jade in Topaz - Barbara Harris as a phony psychic turned amateur sleuth in his final film, 1976\'s Family Plot. In the same film, the diamond smuggler played by Karen Black could also fit that role, as she wears a long blonde wig in various scenes and becomes increasingly uncomfortable about her line of work.
Hitchcock saw that reliance on actors and actresses was a holdover from the theater tradition. He was a pioneer in using camera movement, camera set ups and montage to explore the outer reaches of cinematic art.
Most critics and Hitchcock scholars, including Donald Spoto and Roger Ebert, agree that Vertigo represents the director\'s most personal and revealing film, dealing with the obsessions of a man who crafts a woman into the woman he desires. Vertigo explores more frankly and at greater length his interest in the relation between sex and death than any other film in his filmography.
Hitchcock often said that his personal favourite was Shadow of a Doubt.
Hitchcock once commented, "The writer and I plan out the entire script down to the smallest detail, and when we\'re finished all that\'s left to do is to shoot the film. Actually, it\'s only when one enters the studio that one enters the area of compromise. Really, the novelist has the best casting since he doesn\'t have to cope with the actors and all the rest."
Hitchcock would storyboard each movie down to the finest detail. He was reported to have never even bothered looking through the viewfinder, since he didn\'t need to do so, though in publicity photos he was shown doing so. He also used this as an excuse to never have to change his films from his initial vision. If a studio asked him to change a film, he would claim that it was already shot in a single way, and that there were no alternate takes to consider.
However this view of Hitchcock as a director who relied more on pre-production than on the actual production itself has been challenged by the book Hitchcock At Work written by Bill Krohn, the American correspondent of Cahiers du Cinema. Krohn after investigating several script revisions, notes to other production personnel written by or to Hitchcock alongside inspection of storyboards and other production material has observed that Hitchcock\'s work often deviated from how the screenplay was written or how the film was originally envisioned. He noted that the myth of storyboards in relation to Hitchcock, often regurgitated by generations of commentators on Hitchcock\'s movies was to a great degree perpetuated by Hitchcock himself or the publicity arm of the studios. A great example would be the famous cropduster sequence of North by Northwest which wasn\'t storyboarded at all. After the scene was filmed, the publicity arm asked Hitchcock to make storyboards to promote the film and Hitchcock in turn hired an artist to match the scenes in detail. While Hitchcock did do a great deal of preparation for all his movies, he was fully cognizant that the actual film-making process often deviated from the best laid plans and was flexible to adapt to the changes and needs of production. Even on the occasions when storyboards were made, the scene which was shot did differ from it significantly.
Similarly much of Hitchcock\'s hatred of actors had been exaggerated. Hitchcock simply did not tolerate the method approach as he believed that actors should only concentrate on their performances and leave work on script and character to the directors and screenwriters. In a Sight and Sound interview, he stated that, \' the method actor is OK in the theatre because he has a free space to move about. But when it comes to cutting the face and what he sees and so forth, there must be some discipline\'.Alfred Hitchcock. BFI (Because Films Inspire). Retrieved on 2008-03-04. During the making of Lifeboat, Walter Slezak, who played the German character, stated that Hitchcock knew the mechanics of acting better than anyone he knew. Several critics have observed that despite his reputation as a man who disliked actors, several actors who worked with him gave fine, often brilliant performances and these performances contribute to the film\'s success.
Regarding Hitchcock\'s sometimes less than pleasant relationship with actors, there was a persistent rumor that he had said that actors were cattle. Hitchcock later denied this, typically tongue-in-cheek, clarifying that he had only said that actors should be treated like cattle. Carole Lombard, tweaking Hitchcock and drumming up a little publicity, brought some cows along with her when she reported to the set of Mr. and Mrs. Smith.Mr. and Mrs. Smith (1941). Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. For Hitchcock, the actors, like the props, were part of the film\'s setting.
The first book devoted to the director is simply named Hitchcock. It is a document of a one-week interview by François Truffaut in 1967. (ISBN 0-671-60429-5)
In the late 1950s the French New Wave critics, especially Éric Rohmer, Claude Chabrol, and François Truffaut, were among the first to see and promote his films as artistic works. Hitchcock was one of the first directors to whom they applied their auteur theory, which stresses the artistic authority of the director in the film-making process.
Template:Cquote2 Hitchcock\'s innovations and vision have influenced a great number of filmmakers, producers, and actors. His influence helped start a trend for film directors to control artistic aspects of their movies without answering to the movie\'s producer.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded Hitchcock the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, in 1967. However, despite six earlier nominations, he never won an Oscar in a contested category. His Oscar nominations were:
Rebecca, which Hitchcock directed, won the 1940 Best Picture Oscar for its producer David O. Selznick. In addition to Rebecca and Suspicion, two other films Hitchcock directed, Foreign Correspondent and Spellbound, were nominated for Best Picture.
Hitchcock is considered the Best Film Director of all time by The Screen Directory.The Screen Directory Hitchcock was knighted in 1980.
Sixteen films directed by Hitchcock earned Oscar nominations, though only six of those films earned Hitchcock himself a nomination. The total number of Oscar nominations (including winners) earned by films he directed is fifty. Four of those films earned Best Picture nominations.
Along with Walt Disney, Hitchcock was one of the first prominent motion picture producers to fully envision just how popular the medium of television would become. From 1955 to 1965, Hitchcock was the host and producer of a long-running television series entitled Alfred Hitchcock Presents.Alfred Hitchcock Presents. TV.COM. Retrieved on 2008-03-05. While his films had made Hitchcock\'s name strongly associated with suspense, the TV series made Hitchcock a celebrity himself. His irony-tinged voice, image, and mannerisms became instantly recognizable and were often the subject of parody.
The title-theme of the show pictured a minimalist caricature of Hitchcock\'s profile (he drew it himself; it is composed of only nine lines) which his real silhouette then filled. His introductions before the stories in his program always included some sort of wry humor, such as the description of a recent multi-person execution hampered by having only one electric chair, while two are now shown with a sign "Two chairs--no waiting!" He directed a few episodes of the TV series himself, and he upset a number of movie production companies when he insisted on using his TV production crew to produce his motion picture Psycho. In the late 1980s, a new version of Alfred Hitchcock Presents was produced for television, making use of Hitchcock\'s original introductions in a colorised form.
"Hitch" used a curious little tuneAlfred Hitchcock (suspense anthology). Media Management Group. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. by the French composer Charles Gounod (1818-1893),Filmography by year for Charles Gounod. Internet Movie Database. Retrieved on 2008-03-04. the composer of the 1859 opera Faust, as the theme "song" for his television programs, after it was suggested to him by composer Bernard Herrmann. Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra included the piece, Funeral March of a Marionette, in one of their extended play 45 rpm discs for RCA Victor during the 1950s.
Alfred Hitchcock appears as a character in the popular juvenile detective series, Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators. The long-running detective series was created by Robert Arthur, who wrote the first several books, although other authors took over after he left the series. The Three Investigators -- Jupiter Jones, Bob Andrews and Peter Crenshaw -- were amateur detectives, slightly younger than the Hardy Boys. In the introduction to each book, "Alfred Hitchcock" introduces the mystery, and he sometimes refers a case to the boys to solve. At the end of each book, the boys report to Hitchcock, and sometimes give him a memento of their case.
When the real Alfred Hitchcock died, the fictional Hitchcock in the Three Investigators books was replaced by a retired detective named Hector Sebastian. At this time, the series title was changed from Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators to The Three Investigators.
At the height of Hitchcock\'s success, he was also asked to introduce a set of books with his name attached. The series was a collection of short stories by popular short-story writers, primarily focused on suspense and thrillers. These titles included Alfred Hitchcock\'s Anthology, Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Stories to be Read with the Door Locked, Alfred Hitchcock\'s Monster Museum, Alfred Hitchcock\'s Supernatural Tales of Terror and Suspense, Alfred Hitchcock\'s Spellbinders in Suspense, Alfred Hitchcock\'s Witch\'s Brew, Alfred Hitchcock\'s Ghostly Gallery, Alfred Hitchcock\'s A Hangman\'s Dozen and Alfred Hitchcock\'s Haunted Houseful. Hitchcock himself was not actually involved in the reading, reviewing, editing or selection of the short stories; in fact, even his introductions were ghost-written. The entire extent of his involvement with the project was to lend his name and collect a check.
Some notable writers whose works were used in the collection include Shirley Jackson (Strangers in Town, The Lottery), T.H. White (The Once and Future King), Robert Bloch, H. G. Wells (The War of the Worlds), Robert Louis Stevenson, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Twain and the creator of The Three Investigators, Robert Arthur.
Hitchcock also wrote a mystery story for Look magazine in 1943, "The Murder of Monty Woolley." This was a sequence of captioned photographs inviting the reader to inspect the pictures for clues to the murderer\'s identity; Hitchcock cast the performers as themselves: Woolley, Doris Merrick, and make-up man Guy Pearce, whom Hitchcock identified, in the last photo, as the murderer. The article was reprinted in Games Magazine in November/December 1980.
For a complete list of all his films go to:
Alfred Hitchcock had a dislike of egg yolk. He once said:
Biographer Patrick McGilligan confirmed Hitchcock\'s avoidance of eggsPatrick McGilligan, Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light (New York: HarperCollins, 2003), page 18, while noting that the director had actually tried them as a young man, then discovered he didn\'t like them. He was especially annoyed by poached eggs. His daughter Patricia, however, stated that "He loved souffles.""Alfred Hitchcock and To Catch a Thief - An Appreciation" (DVD)
Hitchcock also had a serious fear of the police, which was the reason he said he never learned to drive. His reasoning was that if one never drove, then one would never have an opportunity to be pulled over by the police and issued a ticket. However, Patrick McGilligan wrote that "though Hitchcock pooh-poohed driving, insisting to interviewers that he didn\'t even know how, he often chauffeured his daughter to school at Marymount [a private academy for girls],Marymount of Santa Barbara. Marymount of Santa Barbara. Retrieved on 2008-03-06. and for a long time drove her to Sunday Mass."Patrick McGilligan, pg. 243 His fear of the police can be attributed to a circumstance encountered by Hitchcock in his youth, which he told a number of interviewers and mentioned in the PBS documentary The Men Who Made the Movies. In an attempt to punish Hitchcock for an instance of misbehavior, Alfred\'s father detailed in writing that the young Hitchcock had engaged in some form of childish mischief. Hitchcock\'s father then handed the description to Alfred, sending him to the local police station to demonstrate his wrongdoing. In response to the written notice, the on-duty police officer immediately brought Hitchcock to an empty cell and locked him there for a full 10 minutes, citing the justification for this action as a means to reprimand the young boy. Undoubtedly, history has recorded this incident as scarring. This perhaps influenced his signature theme in his movies where an innocent person would become entangled in the web of another guilty person\'s behaviour. This can be noted in many of his films, and a possible reason would be due to his hatred for authority, and his siding with the innocent. He also manages to convey this message to his audience in order to allow them to take his (the innocent) side. Alfred Hitchcock (I) - Biography
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