Hitchcock

I have chosen to look in depth (at least a little bit) at Alfred Hitchcock, as he is often known as 'The Master of Suspense' and is the director of some of the greatest classic thrillers of our time, such as 'Psycho' (1960), 'Rear Window' (1954), 'The Birds' (1963) and 'The 39 Steps' (1935). By looking at how someone with as much experience as Alfred Hitchcock manages to create suspense, over 40 years ago, we can take the techniques he used and hopefully apply them to our own Thriller opening.

Alfred Hitchcock was born in 1899, before films with sound in (the 'talkies') even existed. However, as development of these films began to get more advanced, Hitchcock got a job in Lasky Studios, London as a title designer. He designed the titles for all the movies made at the studio for the next two years. In 1923, he got his first chance at directing when the director of 'Always Tell Your Wife'(1923) fell ill and Hitch completed the movie. Impressed by his work, studio chiefs gave him his first directing assignment on 'Number 13' (1922); however, before it could be finished, the studio closed its British operation. Hitchcock was then hired by Michael Balcon to work as an assistant director for the company later to be known as Gainsborough Pictures. In reality, Hitchcock did more than this -- working as a writer, title designer and art director. After several films for the company, Hitchcock was given the chance to direct a British/German co-production called 'The Pleasure Garden' (1925). Hitchcock's career as a director finally began. Hitchcock went on to become the most widely known and influential director in the history of world cinema with a significant body of work produced over 50 years.

Hitchcock had many trademarks throughout his films, including cameo appearances by himself, usually at the beginning of the films, so as not to distract the audience from the plot. He also tends to have a recurring motif of a lost or assumed identity, such as in Psycho (1960), with Norman and his 'Mother', The 39 Steps (1935), with Hannay lying about his identity throughout and Vertigo (1958), where Judy lies in order to fool Scottie. In orderto create suspense in his films, he often cuts between different shots to extend cinematic time, such as the infamous shower scene is Psycho (see clip). In a lot of his early films, he used to create shadows on the walls to create more suspense and tension. He also tended to use a lot of blonde women as his female leads, including Grace Kelly in 'Rear Window', Kim Novak in 'Vertigo', and Ingrid Bergman. He also tended to use a lot of 'MacGuffins' or items or devices that drove the plot and were of great interest to the characters on screen, but which the audience could forget once they had served their purpose, such as the $40,000 in 'Psycho'.