Alfred Hitchcock by Douglas Cunningham (Editor)Regarded as ""The Master of Suspense"" and one of the most influential filmmakers of all time, Alfred Hitchcock is remembered for a long career, consisting of more than fifty films made in six decades. This volume discusses themes that make a film truly ""Hitchcockian""-the plot twist, voyeurism, and the innocent man accused-and analyzes some of Hitchcock's best-known work, including Psycho, North by Northwest, Vertigo, Rear Window, and more. This inaugural volume in the Critical Insights Film series contains insightful essays analyzing the reasons for this film classic's acclaim, as well as its influences on the film industry as we know it today. Essays are 2,500 to 5,000 words in length and offer analyses of Alfred Hitchcock based on cultural and historical contexts, close viewings from particular critical standpoints (from traditional to postmodern), comparisons in the light of other films, and critical receptions over time. All essays are written by renowned film scholars of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, providing in-depth, academic coverage of all key issues and interpretations. Finally, the volume's appendixes offer a section of useful reference resources: About This Volume Critical Context: Original Introductory Essays Critical Readings: Original In-Depth Essays Further Readings Detailed Bibliography Detailed Bio of the Editor General Subject Index .
Call Number: eBook
ISBN: 9781682171103
Publication Date: 2017-01-30
Alfred Hitchcock: The Legacy of Victorianism by Paula Marantz CohenThis provocative study traces Alfred Hitchcock's long directorial career from Victorianism to postmodernism. Paula Marantz Cohen considers a sampling of Hitchcock's best films--Shadow of a Doubt, Rear Window, Vertigo, Psycho--as well as some of his more uneven ones--Rope, The Wrong Man, Topaz--and makes connections between his evolution as a filmmaker and trends in the larger society. Drawing on a number of methodologies including feminism, psychoanalysis, and family systems, the author provides an insightful look at the paradox of a Victorian-style gentleman who evolved into one of the leading masters of the modern medium of film. Cohen posits that Hitchcock's films are, in part, a masculine response to the domestic, psychological novels that had appealed primarily to women during the Victorian era. His career, she argues, can be seen as an attempt to balance "the two faces of Victorianism": the masculine legacy of law and hierarchy and the feminine legacy of feeling and imagination. Cohen asserts that Hitchcock's films reflect his Victorian legacy and serve as a map for ideological trends. She charts his development from his British period through his classic Hollywood years into his later phase, tracing a conceptual evolution that corresponds to an evolution in cultural identity--one that builds on a Victorian inheritance and ultimately discards it.
Call Number: eBook
ISBN: 9780813157795
Publication Date: 1995
A Companion to Alfred Hitchcock by Thomas Leitch (Editor)The most comprehensive volume ever published on Alfred Hitchcock, covering his career and legacy as well as the broader cultural and intellectual contexts of his work. Contains thirty chapters by the leading Hitchcock scholars Covers his long career, from his earliest contributions to other directors' silent films to his last uncompleted last film Details the enduring legacy he left to filmmakers and audiences alike
Hitchcock on Hitchcock, Volume 1: Selected Writings and Interviews by Alfred Hitchcock; Sidney Gottlieb (Editor)Gathered here for the first time are Alfred Hitchcock's reflections on his own life and work. In this ample selection of largely unknown and formerly inaccessible interviews and essays, Hitchcock provides an enlivening commentary on a career that spanned decades and transformed the history of the cinema. Bringing the same exuberance and originality to his writing as he did to his films, he ranges from accounts of his own life and experiences to techniques of filmmaking and ideas about cinema in general. Wry, thoughtful, witty, and humorous--as well as brilliantly informative--this selection reveals another side of the most renowned filmmaker of our time. Sidney Gottlieb not only presents some of Hitchcock's most important pieces, but also places them in their historical context and in the context of Hitchcock's development as a director. He reflects on Hitchcock's complicated, often troubled, and continually evolving relationships with women, both on and off the set. Some of the topics Hitchcock touches upon are the differences between English and American attitudes toward murder, the importance of comedy in film, and the uses and techniques of lighting. There are also many anecdotes of life among the stars, reminiscences from the sets of some of the most successful and innovative films of this century, and incisive insights into working method, film history, and the role of film in society. Unlike some of the complex critical commentary that has emerged on his life and work, the director's own writing style is refreshingly straightforward and accessible. Throughout the collection, Hitchcock reveals a delight and curiosity about his medium that bring all his subjects to life.
Call Number: eBook
ISBN: 9780520960947
Publication Date: 1997
Hitchcock on Hitchcock, Volume 2 by Alfred Hitchcock; Sidney Gottlieb (Editor)This second volume of Alfred Hitchcock's reflections on his life and work and the art of cinema contains material long out of print, not easily accessible, and in some cases forgotten or unknown. Edited by Sidney Gottlieb, this new collection of interviews, articles with the great director's byline, and "as-told-to" pieces provides an enlivening perspective on a career that spanned seven decades and transformed the history of cinema. In writings and interviews imbued with the same exuberance and originality that he brought to his films, Hitchcock ranges from accounts of his own life and experiences to provocative comments on filmmaking techniques and cinema in general. Wry, thoughtful, witty, and humorous-as well as brilliantly informative and insightful-this volume contains much valuable material that adds to our understanding and appreciation of a titan who decades after his death remains one of the most renowned and influential of all filmmakers. François Truffaut once said that Hitchcock "had given more thought to the potential of his art than any of his colleagues." This profound contemplation of his art is superbly captured in the pieces from all periods of Hitchcock's career gathered in this volume, which reveal fascinating details about how he envisioned and attempted to create a "pure cinema" that was entertaining, commercially successful, and artistically ambitious and innovative in an environment that did not always support this lofty goal.
See chapter 3. Anatomy of aural suspense in Rope and Vertigo
Violence in the Films of Alfred Hitchcock: A Study in Mimesis by David HumbertParting ways with the Freudian and Lacanian readings that have dominated recent scholarly understanding of Hitchcock, David Humbert examines the roots of violence in the director's narratives and finds them not in human sexuality but in mimesis. Through an analysis of seven key films, he argues that Girard's model of mimetic desire--desire oriented by imitation of and competition with others--best explains a variety of well-recognized themes, including the MacGuffin, the double, the innocent victim, the wrong man, the transfer of guilt, and the scapegoat. This study will appeal not only to Hitchcock fans and film scholars but also to those interested in Freud and Girard and their competing theories of desire.