A Discussion On The Work And Legacy Of Alfred Hitchcock

I intend to discuss the work of my favourite film director, Alfred Hitchcock. In doing so I aim to provide an examination of his legacy.

Alfred Hitchcock was the son of an East End greengrocer William Hitchcock and his wife Emma. Raised as a strict Catholic and attending Saint Ignatius College, a school run by Jesuits, Hitchcock had a normal upbringing. His first job outside the family business was in 1915 as an estimator for the Henley Telegraph and Cable Company. His interest in movies began at around this time; frequently visiting the cinema and reading US trade journals. In 1920 Hitchcock learned that ‘Lasky’ were to open a studio in London and managed to secure a job 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 Hitchcock completed the movie. Impressed by his work, studio chiefs gave him his first directing assignment on Number13 (1922), however, before it could be finished, the studio closed its British operation. Hitchcock was then hired by Michael Balcony to work as an assistan

Hitchcock’s work always presented an unmistakable worldview that controlled his audience to the point that they were truly at his mercy. Hitchcock’s worldview was bound up with cinematic language and created a relationship with the spectator of the film. I believe the plot to most of Hitchcock’s films merely brakes down to the concept of looking or spying. Hitchcock’s films were a classic illustration of the qualities of mainstream Hollywood.

Alfred Hitchcock was always the classic auteur, his legacy included a number of films that lacked creative control or as I see it, an urge merely to make money. Hitchcock’s typical themes and styles are hard to identify. Many critics reacted to these problems by ignoring them or by treating them as flawed mistakes. It was from these situations that an auteur theory was created. The critics of his time set two rules to establish Hitchcock as a consistent auteur, firstly, ‘trace the development of a consistent theme throughout his work’, and secondly, ‘show that the theme is expressed in a style suitable to the theme in all his films’ But as I can see visibly, it is an incomplete theory because it needs to resort to historical background in order to account for films which do not ‘fit’ their explanation of a directors style and work

Some topics in this essay:
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