In-Depth Analysis: Alfred Hitchcock’s Directorial Style and Techniques

This report provides an in-depth analysis of Alfred Hitchcock's life, career, and directorial techniques, focusing on his influence on filmmaking from 1950 to 2000. It explores his early career, rise to international fame, and significant contributions to Hollywood, highlighting films like 'Rebecca,' 'Vertigo,' and 'Psycho.' The report details his numerous awards and critical acclaim, including multiple Academy Award nominations and recognition from prestigious film institutions. A critical analysis of Hitchcock's style, including his use of voyeurism, light and shadow, and camera techniques, is presented. The report also includes detailed comments on 'Vertigo' and 'Rebecca,' examining their themes, innovative techniques, and impact on cinema. This analysis emphasizes Hitchcock's lasting legacy as one of the most celebrated and influential directors in film history. Desklib provides a platform to access this and many other solved assignments.

Running head: ANALYSIS OF DIRECTOR
ANALYSIS OF DIRECTOR
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Introduction
The paper is going to talk about the selected director who has been working from
1950 to 2000. Now, for the paper Alfred Hitchcock has been chosen to be elaborately
discussed. Hitchcock has been one of the most celebrated and worshipped director for the
presentation of his visions of uncertainty in the movies that he had offered. His movies are
considered to be the discovery of grammatical language for movies. It is believed that
moviemakers of contemporary period are inspired by Hitchcock whenever they make movies.
He has worked for more than six decades and created more than fifty films. Hitchcock is one
of the few directors who gathered courage to show something new to the audience rather he
was one of the very few directors to be existing in the beginning of the film industry. His
movies are detailed and replete of justified emotions of human world. His movies are not
made for the sole purpose of entertaining the audience but his intention was to educate the
audience with enriched thoughts and amazing and flawless artwork of camera. His movies are
the cauldrons of mixing up strange emotions with uncanny murder (Burget). Suspense seems
to be a child-play to Hitchcock. Therefore, in this paper, the first part will talk about his life
and career then it will talk about his best movies and honors he had received and finally it
will talk about two of his best movies.
Life and Career
The director was born in Leytonstone Essex in the year 1899 and he entered the world
of movies in the year 1919. Although he started his career at an early age yet he did not start
it with directing movie rather he started as the title card designer after he was done with the
course of a technical clerk. He also completed the training of copy writer for a cable
corporation of telegraph. The first time he came up with his administrative representation is

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that of a film namely, The Pleasure Garden that was released in the year 1925. The
independent movie that him success for the first time is The Lodger: A Story of the London
Fog (1927). He was not only a director but also a performer in his own films. He had been
seen as acted in certain cameo roles that will always be cherished by the movie lovers across
the globe. He directed a couple of thrillers during the 1930’s namely, The 39 Steps and The
Lady Vanishes stole the heart of the audience helping him to pave the path for his entrance
into Hollywood.
With the arrival of 1940 and so Hitchcock gained the popularity of an international
filmmaker and with the constant push from the producer, David O. Selznick he indulged
himself into Hollywood completely. He composed a garland of successful movies
incorporating Rebecca, Suspicion, Notorious and movies like Foreign Correspondent and
Shadow of a Doubt are some honorable mentions in his early stage of filmmaking. He was
nominated for the movies like Rebecca, Spellbound and Lifeboat and Rebecca won the best
picture in the Academy Award. The success that he made out of making four movies in the
1960’s transported him to some other level turning the whole world of movies upside down.
Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest and Psycho made a complete series of best
movies of all time and are still considered to be the best films made in history by certain
critiques. He in fact, won nominations for the best director for Rear Window and Psycho. The
worldwide poll consisting of hundred movie critiques took a massive decision of removing
Citizen Kane by Orson Welles from the position of the greatest movie ever made from the
house of British Film Institution and replaced with Vertigo. Eight top movies of his career
were placed in National Film Registry of United States by the year 2018.

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Honors and Awards of the Director
The phenomenon director was nominated for six times as the best director in the
world’s biggest award for cinema, the Academy Awards. He was also nominated in the
Emmy Awards for four periods. He was nominated for his works in his entire lifetime for
total number of 67 times and won 32 several awards. He won so many awards and the list
seems to be endless. He won Golden Laurel Awards for eight times and won Golden Globe
twice. He also won awards like Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, the Film Society of
Lincoln Center’s Gala Tribute Award, Directors Guild of America Award, AFI Life
Achievement Award. He had also been able to bag awards like National Board of Review of
Motion Pictures Award and the Saturn Award. He was nominated in Oscar for six of his films
that are Rebecca, Lifeboat, Spellbound, Rear Window and Psycho. At the AFI 100 years of
100 movies list carefully chosen by more than fifteen hundred critiques picked Hitchcock’s
four films with the ranking at 18(Rebecca), 40(North by Northwest), 42(Rear window), and
61(Vertigo) in the year 1998. On the tenth anniversary of AFI movies that had been released
from the year of 1996 to 2000 the list was again updated where Vertigo came at ninth
position, Psycho was at fourteenth, Rear Window 48 and North by Northwest at 55. He is also
prevailing with success in the category of mystery movie list made by AFI where four of
these above mentioned films occupy the top ten movies, Vertigo at rank one with Rear
Window, North by Northwest, Dial M for Murder at the rank of 3, 7 and 9 respectively.
He won the British Academy Film Awards in the year 1971 in the category of
British Academy of Film and Television Awards (BAFTA). In the top ten list made by
British Film Institute, his The 39 Steps and The Lady Vanishes came at the place of 4 and 35
respectively. His works like Notorious, I Confess and The Man Who Knew Too Much were
nominated in the Cannes Film Festival. The first two were nominated in the Grand Prix du
Festival International du Film and the latter was nominated for Palme d’Or (Nadel 118).

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From the Film Society of Lincoln Corner he won The Chaplin Awards. In the year of 1960 he
won two stars. The former is with the icon of using classic film camera that was the
representation of his motion pictures and the other one is the television set symbol for his
work to have broadcast television.
Critical analysis of the Director
Alfred Hitchcock is believed to be the most celebrated and discussed director of the
past century. He has presented his movies in a way that has dragged the audience to change
the perspective and style of watching movies. The method of watching a movie and
perceiving it has been completely transformed by the way he has directed his movies. He was
an amazing artist who could deceive the minds of the audience throughout his movies where
he used to scatter mysteries from the beginning. He could make the audience see what he
wanted them to see through his presentation while he could make them unseen things that he
did not intend to. The theme of voyeurism has been created by Hitchcock with the usage of
several techniques of the lens and camera. The concept of the voyeur has been introduced by
the artwork of camera to the audience in order to make them feel crippled and disturbed with
the representation in the movies (Driscoll 4). These techniques include a spider-web shadow
technique that aided him to make the audience see what he intends to show them. He has
always worked magically with light and shadow in his films. The existence of prevalent
darkness in his movies used to add a close in kind of effect in his movies. He was not only
good with darkness he was certainly the master of lights as well. The way he had dealt with
camera was so different that his movies came out to be extremely different than his
contemporary directors. He believed that he could create the mood of the movie by plating
with low key and edge lighting. He had experimented with odd angles so that the audience is
glued to the morbid perspectives and unbearable theme of his movies. He had effectively

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involved every member of his team to be the part of his movies equally to make the best films
out of the entire productions (Hitchcock).
Two Films by the Director
Vertigo is considered to be one of the most revealing films from the treasure trove of
the director. The movie had starred James Stewart along with Barbara Bel Geddes and Kim
Novak though he wanted to work with Vera Miles. However, she refused to play a part in the
movie because of her pregnancy that revealed how direct and straightforward Hitchcock had
been as he mentioned in one of his interviews that he hated pregnant women because they
would be having children after that. James Stewart being in the character of Scottie was a
police inspector before and now is seen to be suffering from acrophobia. He gradually
develops a kind of obsession for a woman played by Novak. However, ut is certain that
anything that crosses the threshold of normalcy cannot be anticipated to bring something
good to the situation rather it disrupts the entire balance and destroys the worth of the matter.
The same happens here as well. The obsession become so overpowering in the movie that the
overwhelming thoughts of Hitchcock probed into the minds of the audience rethink about sex
and death in a completely new manner (Taylor). The way in Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion or in
the popular myth of Pygmalion the creator falls in love with his creation. Here Scottie’s
obsession has been shown in the same way. Scottie reshapes and rebuilds the image of the
woman in his heat in a way that he cannot think beyond her and turns madly obsessed with
her. It is delving into such a personal level that sometimes the movie seems to behave like a
moving lump in the throat that neither can be swallowed nor thrown up. Certain scenes are so
disturbingly perfect that one would get confused that whether it was a love scene or a murder
scene. The intensity with which Hitchcock would have shot a love scene, the same he puts in
a murder or a scene of suspense. The way a relationship between the desire to accomplish

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intercourse and death is explored in this movie is recommendable and suggested by all the
critiques to be followed by other new directors.
It has worked with an innovative technique of camera that has been invented by Irmin
Roberts. This technique in the field of filmography is known as dolly zoom. Now this
technique has been so famous and amazing that many filmmakers after this has imitated the
technique to have used in their movies. This movie was premiered in San Sebastian
International Film Festival. He won recommendable recognition there. It is considered to be
one of the best classics ever made in the history of world movies. However, some audience
were not really happy with the stark reality of the movie therefore it occupied a lot of
negative impression. Another fact about the movie is that this movie was the last production
of the collaborative effect of Hitchcock and Stewart. This movie was chosen at the second
position after Citizen Ken in Sight and Sound however after ten years the former came at the
first position.
The next movie would be Rebecca. It was the first American film composed by
Hitchcock with the collaboration of Selznick. The setting of the movie is the modified
Hollywood version of the Cornwall of England and it is certainly an adaptation of the English
novel written by Daphne du Maurier. The story does not have a protagonist with name. The
movie is starred by Laurence Olivier and Joan Fontaine (Sonber). The movie revolves around
a young naïve woman who ends up in getting married with an aristocrat who is widowed. The
woman finds herself in the huge country house of the English man. He finds out about
Rebecca who is the first wife of her husband. She was elegant and reputed among every high
class people. She found Rebecca to be unparallel and tried her best to match her elegance.
Rebecca departed in a mysterious way. Even though Rebecca was not present in this movie in
person yet the movie is rotating around the existence of Rebecca and the effort of being

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another Rebecca. The film was so great that it not only won the hearth of the critiques but
also presented he movie with the best picture in the 13th Academy Awards.
Conclusion
Therefore it can be concluded that the director has invented different styles and angles
that helped him to know and explore new ways of presenting the artworks of camera. The
artworks that he worked with were so new that inspired the directors of next generations and
the directors of the current times. His movies are exemplary in the field of filmmaking. The
introduction of dolly zoom, playing with light and shadow, keeping lowlight in the entire
movie and keeping the mystery intact are the masterstrokes of Hitchcock that made him
unique with his stylistic apprehension of themes and characters of the movies. He has been
the only director to have been nominated for 67 times and winning them for more than half of
the total numbers. It is undeniable that he will always be remembered and cherished for his
amazing works.

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References
Burget, Martin. "Works of alfredhitchcock: An analysis." Unpublished doctoral dissertation).
Masarykovauniverzita, Filozofickáfakulta (2014).
Haeffner, Nicholas. Alfred Hitchcock. Routledge, 2015.
Hitchcock, Alfred, et al. Shadow of a Doubt. Universal Studios, 2018.
Nadel, Alan. "Alfred Hitchcock." Fifty Hollywood Directors (2014): 118.
Sonbert, Warren. "Alfred Hitchcock, Master of Morality." Framework: The Journal of
Cinema and Media 56.1 (2015): 200-203.
Taylor, John Russell. Hitch: The Life and Times of Alfred Hitchcock. A&C Black, 2013.
Driscoll, Paige A. "“The Hitchcock Touch”: Visual Techniques in the Work of Alfred
Hitchcock." International ResearchScape Journal 1.1 (2014): 4.