Alfred Hitchcock
The Auteur - Hitchcock
"Good Evening, Ladies and Gentleman"
What's an Auteur?
- A filmmaker, usually the director the one that characterises the film.
e.g. Kubrick, Jean-Luc Godard, Hitchcock, usually called 'filmmakers' more than simply a 'director'
Tarantino may be a modern example?
Catviers du CInema - Journal about films
-Andre Bazin,
Auteur is french for Author.
History of the film as history of Auteurs
-Like artists
-Original work
-Creative controls
-Personal film genre
-Auteurs often seen as either breaking rules or making the rules. Personification of the genre
Saris (1962)
Why Hitchcock?
-immensely long careers, working for over 50 years
-Master of suspense, something he became synonymous with
-Influential in genres such as suspense, horrors and thrillers
-Not 'art house' films but definitely influenced by less 'mainstream' types of stuff such as surrealism and expressionism
Technical competence of the director
-Silent films, telling a story physically, the style of his shots. Had never really been seen or done that well before
-Pioneer of 'stalker cam'
-Clever use of montage and cutting to create tension in spite of production code (39-60)
1920
-Started film history in 20's
-Alot of auteurs have art backgrounds, which isn't that surprising judging by close relation of filmmaking and art.
-Continued apprenticeship at Gainsborough
-Saw work of masters like Murnau's Nosferatu > influenced Hitchcock's work, expressionism and silent movies
The Lodger - 1927
His first fully acknowledged film, very avant-garde, Cubism?
Lots of makeup, very clever use of shadow to make crucifix perfectly across face and eyes.
Everything's very cisual and clever. Cuts to text "be careful, I'll get you yet!". Music is very important. Creates mood for each scene. Sped up speech and mouth movements, talk really fast. Clever montage and overlapping, sort of ghostly. Actually shot through a ceiling to show, visually, the sound of footsteps. Lots of makeup
Champagne - 1928
Seeing two characters kiss through the glass. Voyeurism is a common theme in most (if not all) his films.
Full film in 10 parts ^^ about 1:30 is the start of some really cool montage stuff
Jamaica Inn (1939)
Looking through a keyhole
The Dolly Zoom
Vertigo shot
Cutting + Montage
"What is drama, but life with all the dull bits cut out?" - Hitchcock
Psycho 1966 storyboard - Loads of storyboard for very short sequence of film, the shower scene. Can see all the suggestions and use of cutting and camera shots used.
"Montage means assemble of pieces of film"
"Juxtaposition of imagery in various sizes"
"Impressionistically - can't just show a nude woman getting stabbed."
Shower scene in Psycho
- Shadow on curtain
- Sound
- Film cuts
- Blood in water
- Hand collapsing and losing life
- No actual graphic violence shown
- Plenty of tension and suggestion
- Curtains ripping as hand clings and falls
- Close up lifeless blank eye
Detective on stairs
- Waist shot
- Medium shot
- Then really high, as if we're looking down and unable to do anything to help
- Figure comes in quick & stabs
- Next cut is close up on face
- Tumbles & then big bass instrument
- Sound plays a massive part
Hitchcock style
Expressionism - form evokes emotion
Cameo appearances by the director, almost like artists signature on a painting
Use of certain actors (Similar to someone like QT nowadays) - Cary Grant, Henry Fonda, Doris Day etc
Use of blondes.
Suspense
-When we can see danger, but characters can't. Feeling of tense helplessness
"There is no terror in the bang, only the anticipation of it."
Expressionism
Not concerned with realism or naturalism
Vertigo shot, zooming away from you when you look down, feeling of realising just how bloody high you are and crapping yourself.
High camera shot, outside and inside. Almost voyeuristic, still camera, you watch situations and incidents unfold in front of your eyes. As if you're sat still from a vantage point - spying.
His hallucinating scene. Music, mad colours, new technology, very modern and graphic, feeling of falling.
Very artistic, abstract and clever - it works.
'Suicide of Madeleine - High shot'
Reminiscent of Nosferatu
Trauma
- Sets up reason for his fear of trauma at the start
- Descent into madness
- Becomes obsessed with person he's asked to spy
- Voyeurism
- You often see her back in camera shots, something that's elusive and keeps getting away
- Meridian green is a constant theme of colour. Maybe this was one of the first to have this much attention to detail as this is common place in more of the 'arthouse' style films now, such as Oldboy with it's colours and interior design
- Madeline has same looks and hairstyle as Calotta - the ghost that's haunting her
Scotti: "Their true name is Sequoia Sempervirans - always green and ever living"
Judy > Meridian comes back
Hitchcock quotes:
"Fright complex is rooted in every individual"
"Scare women: 80% of cinema for films are women"
"I know what's coming next, I say, do you?"
"Expecting cliche, can not have cliche."
Cinema changed
"Photographs of people talking bares no resemblance to the art of cinema"
If something's global, because of dubbing etc, the translation can cock up the script. So maybe this is why his work is so physical through the body language, camera work and cutting, montage etc.
"Make it visual, make talking just part of the atmosphere."
Thrillers NOT Horrors
"I believe in putting horror in mind of audience, not on screen."
Collaboration with Salvador Dali
Dreams designed by Dali in 'Spellbound'
Eyes everywhere, overlapping images, first person camera. Variety of shots. Zooms into head for dream sequences.
Birds eye view, birds symbolised as harbingers of doom, some symbolism even in Psycho
Quite prominent on advertising and on posters for the films. This is rare and not the case for most directors. Probably just as, if not more famous than the films. People go watch the films because they're by these filmmakers and expect a certian unique kind of film and expect it to please them as it's by that filmmaker. E.g. Tarantino, David Lynch, Kubrick etc.
Themes
- Ordinary people, extraordinary situations
- Suspense(obviously)
- Voyeurism
- Ideas from Freudian psychology
- Sexual themes
- A female, blonde, in grave danger
Louis B. Mayer - "The sign of a clever auteur is to achieve the illusion that there is a sole individual responsible for magnificent creations that require thousands of people to accomplish."
This notion ^^ imo can be applied to other people aswell, Andy Warhol, Damien Hirst, most famous artists, even Steve Jobs. It's not like Steve Jobs sculpted the iPhone in his bedroom with his bare hands, but that's what alot of people subconsciously assume.
I really like the film posters for Hitchcock films, along with the graphic nature of the dream sequences. I'll look into this more and might even watch a film or two...
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