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- 'Rebecca' (1940) Rotten Tomatoes Score: 98% There are great films, great Hitchcock films, and then there's Rebecca. Joan Fontaine stars as a young and naive woman who marries the handsome and tortured Maxim de Winter, played by Sir Laurence Olivier.
- 'Rear Window' (1954) Rotten Tomatoes Score: 98% James Stewart and Grace Kelly make for a timeless pair in Hitchcock's seminal 1954 masterpiece Rear Window.
- 'The Lady Vanishes' (1938) Rotten Tomatoes Score: 98% Hitchcock's mystery thriller The Lady Vanishes stars Margaret Lockwood and Michael Redgrave. The story concerns an English tourist whose older companion mysteriously disappears during a train ride.
- 'North By Northwest' (1959) Rotten Tomatoes Score: 97% Cary Grant stars in Hitchcock's 1959 spy thriller North by Northwest. The film tells the story of Roger O. Thornhill, a New York executive confused for a government agent.
- Director Cameos in Films. Alfred Hitchcock created the trend of directors making appearances in their own films. Hitchcock made cameo appearances in nearly all of his films, often showing up in the background as an extra or just quickly walking past the camera.
- The Impact of Musical Scores. Alfred Hitchcock understood the importance of using musical scores in film to convey emotion and build suspense. Hitchcock collaborated with composers such as Bernard Herrmann (Psycho, Vertigo, North by Northwest) to create some of the most iconic soundtracks in film history.
- Master of Editing. Alfred Hitchcock was a master of editing and cutting film. One technique he mastered was the "point of view" shot that allowed audiences to see the film through a character's eyes.
- Experimenting with 3D. Alfred Hitchcock was one of the first to ever experiment with 3D in films, as seen in his mystery thriller Dial M for Murder. The film's climax contains a 3D scene in which Margot Wendice reaches out to the audience to clutch a pair of scissors.
Apr 29, 2021 · Hitchcock always maintained that he made films about the things that terrified him the most, and that’s exactly why the audience responded to his constructed nightmares so well. His childhood experiences with the police made him explore crime and the criminal mind through the cinematic lens.
- The 39 Steps
- Rope
- Frenzy
- Shadow of A Doubt
- The Birds
- Rear Window
- Strangers on A Train
- Vertigo
- North by Northwest
- Psycho
One of the earliest Hitchcock movies to feel truly Hitchcockian, The 39 Stepsarguably laid the groundwork for all escapist entertainment. A wrongfully accused man goes on the run from a shady organization. Built around an ominous conspiracy and a MacGuffin that only reveals itself in the finale, this was one of the first movies that earned Hitchcoc...
Hitchcock’s films tend to focus more on plot than character, but Ropeis a great character piece. The movie plays out in real time, edited to look like a single continuous take. Watching Ropeis like watching a stage play (like the one by Patrick Hamilton that the film was based on) as two academics plan and execute the perfect crime.
Hitchcock’s penultimate film, Frenzy, leans more heavily into genre tropes than most of his other movies. It’s a gruesome serial killer thriller; essentially a Hitchcockian slasher. It’s grislier than most of Hitchcock’s other works, but that’s what makes it so entertaining. The haunting antagonist of Frenzy – Bob Rusk, better known as “The Necktie...
Hitchcock delivered one of his most effective rug-pull plot twists in Shadow of a Doubt. A young woman is excited to host her uncle for a visit. However, she comes to the ominous realization that Uncle Charlie is a notorious serial killer. Teresa Wright is a quintessential everywoman faced with a unique dilemma opposite Joseph Cotten’s sinister tur...
One of the earliest “nature thrillers,” The Birdscreated the template for high-concept horror movies. The first act introduces the characters and the supernatural threat they face, the second act follows a group of survivors banding together to stay safe, and the third act brings the terror to a head. The effects in The Birdshaven’t aged particular...
One of Hitchcock’s most familiar trademarks is using his camera to turn the audience into voyeurs. The most obvious example is Rear Window, about an adventurous photographer with a broken leg who escapes the boredom of being stuck at home by spying on his neighbors through a powerful lens. Eventually, he stumbles upon what he believes is a murder s...
Hitchcock’s gripping two-hander Strangers on a Trainhas been homaged more than almost any other movie. It’s a timeless crime thriller about motives and consequences. But the stories influenced by Strangers on a Traintend to miss the most compelling aspect of this tale of two people committing murders for each other. In the Hitchcock original, only ...
Often listed as one of the greatest movies ever made, Vertigois a pitch-perfect blend of film noir and psychological thriller. An acrophobic detective is hired by an old friend to follow his suspicious wife around and ends up falling for her. Like all movies predicated on a twist, Vertigocan be enjoyed countless times. It holds up as an even better...
Revolving around a classic case of mistaken identity, North by Northwest is the closest thing to a James Bond movie directed by Hitchcock. The movie’s sly self-awareness borders on a parody of its own genre. Cary Grant leans into this tone hilariously, playing all the ridiculous scenarios totally straight. North by Northwestis one of the director’s...
Like Vertigo, Psycho’s twisty storytelling makes it endlessly rewatchable. Psychois predicated on two twists: the midpoint twist with the iconic shower murder and the final twist with the truth about Norman Bates. Both halves of the movie are more thrilling when the viewer knows the inevitable terrors that await the characters, keeping them on the ...
Jun 16, 2020 · Alfred Hitchcock ’s “ Psycho ” was released 60 years ago today, and though it is considered by many, including me, to be the greatest horror movie ever made, it’s one that achieves the...
Aug 12, 2024 · Known as the "master of suspense", in 1964 Alfred Hitchcock told the BBC why it was his skill at playing with the audience's emotions that kept them glued to the screen.
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Jun 16, 2010 · 50 years ago today, Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho debuted in midtown Manhattan. At its first showing, the suspenseful thriller enthralled the audience, and since then not a lot's changed.
