Alfred Hitchcock
(Film director)
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock KBE was an English and American film director and producer, at times referred to as "The Master of Suspense". He pioneered many elements of the suspense and psychological thriller genres. He had a successful career in British cinema with both silent films and early talkies and became renowned as England's best director. Hitchcock moved to Hollywood in 1939, and became a US citizen in 1955.
Hitchcock became a highly visible public figure through interviews, movie trailers, cameo appearances in his own films, and the ten years in which he hosted the television programme Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955–1965). He also fashioned for himself a recognisable directorial style. Hitchcock's stylistic trademarks include the use of camera movement that mimics a person's gaze, forcing viewers to engage in a form of voyeurism. In addition, he framed shots to maximise anxiety, fear, or empathy, and used innovative forms of film editing. His work often features fugitives on the run alongside "icy blonde" female characters. In 1978, film critic John Russell Taylor described Hitchcock as "the most universally recognizable person in the world", and "a straightforward middle-class Englishman who just happened to be an artistic genius"
Prior to 1980, there had long been talk of Hitchcock being knighted for his contribution to film. Critic Roger Ebert wrote: "Other British directors like Sir Carol Reed and Sir Charlie Chaplin were knighted years ago, while Hitchcock, universally considered by film students to be one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, was passed over". Hitchcock later received his knighthood from Queen Elizabeth II in the 1980 New Year Honours.
Hitchcock directed more than fifty feature films in a career spanning six decades and is often regarded as one of the most influential directors in cinematic history. Following a 2007 critics' poll by Britain's Daily Telegraph in which he was ranked Britain's greatest filmmaker, one scholar wrote: "Hitchcock did more than any director to shape modern cinema, which would be utterly different without him. His flair was for narrative, cruelly withholding crucial information (from his characters and from the audience) and engaging the emotions of the audience like no one else." Hitchcock's first thriller, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1926), helped shape the thriller genre in film. His 1929 film, Blackmail, is often cited as the first British sound feature film, while Rear Window (1954), Vertigo (1958), North by Northwest (1959), and Psycho (1960) are regularly ranked among the greatest films of all time.
Top 10 Alfred Hitchcock Quotes
I think that "The Birds" was one of the hardest pictures for [my father] to make because it was so technical and he had to be so prepared for it that literally, as we know, when he decided a movie, he would draw the whole movie. Well, it took him a long time to draw all of this.
The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder.
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.'
A good film is when the price of the dinner, the theatre admission and the babysitter were worth it.
The evil that is in the world almost always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding.
Disney has the best casting. If he doesn't like an actor he just tears him up.
Conversation is the enemy of good wine and food.
Since I suspected the producers might change their minds, and might eventually want an all-sound picture, I worked it out that way.
For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake.
This paperback is very interesting, but I find it will never replace a hardcover book - it makes a very poor doorstop.
Alfred Joseph Hitchcock was born on 13 August 1899 in Leytonstone, at the time part of Essex (now part of the London Borough of Waltham Forest). He was the second son and the youngest of three children of William Hitchcock (1862–1914), a greengrocer and poulterer, and Emma Jane Hitchcock (née Whelan; 1863–1942). He was named after his father's brother. Hitchcock was raised as a Roman Catholic, and sent to Salesian College, Battersea, and the Jesuit grammar school St Ignatius' College in Stamford Hill, London. His parents were both of half-English and half-Irish ancestry. He often described a lonely and sheltered childhood that was worsened by his obesity. Around age five, Hitchcock recalled that to punish him for behaving badly, his father sent him to the local police station with a note asking the officer to lock him away for five minutes. This incident implanted a lifelong fear of policemen in Hitchcock, and such harsh treatment and wrongful accusations are frequent themes in his films.
Sources vary on Hitchcock's performance in school. Gene Adair reports that by "most accounts, Alfred was only an average, or slightly above-average, student." However, McGilligan writes that Hitchcock "certainly" excelled academically. When Hitchcock was 15, his father died. In that same year, he left St. Ignatius to study at the London County Council School of Engineering and Navigation in Poplar, London. After leaving, he became a draftsman and advertising designer with a cable company called Henley's.
During the First World War, Hitchcock was called up to serve in the British Army; he was ultimately excused from military service with a 'C3' classification due to his size, height or an unnamed medical condition, but was nonetheless "able to stand service conditions in garrisons at home". Hitchcock joined a cadet regiment of the Royal Engineers in 1917. His military stint was limited, and he mainly engaged in theoretical briefings, weekend drills, and exercises. Hitchcock would march around London's Hyde Park and was required to wear puttees, though he never mastered the proper wrapping of them.
While working at Henley's, Hitchcock began to dabble in creative writing. The company's in-house publication The Henley Telegraph was founded in 1919, and he often submitted short articles, eventually becoming one of its most prolific contributors. His first piece, "Gas" (1919), published in the first issue, tells of a young woman who imagines that she is being assaulted one night in London—only for the twist to reveal that it was all just a hallucination in the dentist's chair induced by the anesthetic.
Hitchcock's second piece was "The Woman's Part" (1919), which involves the conflicted emotions that a husband feels as he watches his actress wife perform onstage. "Sordid" (1920) surrounds an attempt to buy a sword from an antiques dealer, with another twist ending. The short story "And There Was No Rainbow" (1920) is Hitchcock's first brush with possibly censurable material. A young man goes out looking for a brothel, only to stumble into the house of his best friend's girl. "What's Who?" (1920) at first glance seems to be a precursor to Abbott and Costello's "Who's on First?" routine, as it is a short dialogue piece resembling antic dialogue from a music hall skit. It captures the confusion that occurs when a group of actors decide to put together a sketch in which they will impersonate themselves. In the story’s forty sentences, confusion regarding the questions “Who’s me?” and "Who’s you?” rise to comic emotional heights. "The History of Pea Eating" (1920) is a satirical disquisition on the various attempts that people have made over the centuries to eat peas successfully. His final piece, "Fedora" (1921), is his shortest and most enigmatic contribution. It also gives a strikingly accurate description of his future wife Alma Reville, whom he had not yet met.
Near the end of his life, Hitchcock had worked on the script for a projected spy thriller, The Short Night, collaborating with James Costigan, Ernest Lehman and David Freeman. Despite some preliminary work, the screenplay was never filmed. This was caused primarily by Hitchcock's seriously declining health and his concerns for his wife, Alma, who had suffered a stroke. The screenplay was eventually published in Freeman's 1999 book The Last Days of Alfred Hitchcock.
Hitchcock died aged 80 in his Bel Air home of renal failure on 29 April 1980. While biographer Spoto wrote that Hitchcock "rejected suggestions that he allow a priest ... to come for a visit, or celebrate a quiet, informal ritual at the house for his comfort", Jesuit priest Mark Henninger wrote that he and fellow priest Tom Sullivan celebrated Mass at the filmmaker's home; Sullivan heard Hitchcock's confession. He was survived by his wife and their daughter. Lew Wasserman, board chairman and chief executive officer of MCA Inc. and previously Hitchcock’s longtime agent, stated: I am deeply saddened by the death of my close friend and colleague, Sir Alfred Hitchcock, whose death today at his home deprives us all of a great artist and an even greater human being. Almost every tribute paid to Sir Alfred in the past by film critics and historians has emphasised his continuing influence in the world of film. It is that continuing influence, embodied in the magnificent series of films he has given the world, during the last half-century, that will preserve his great spirit, his humour and his wit, not only for us but for succeeding generations of film-goers.
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