87
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock KBE was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema.
In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 feature films, many of which are still widely watched and studied today. Known as the “Master of Suspense”, he became as well known as any of his actor’s thanks to his many interviews, his cameo roles in most of his films, and his hosting and producing the television anthology Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955–65).
His films garnered 46 Academy Award nominations, including six wins, although he never won the award for Best Director despite five nominations.
| Born |
Alfred Joseph Hitchcock
13 August 1899 Leytonstone, Essex, England
|
|---|---|
| Died | 29 April 1980 (aged 80)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
|
| Citizenship |
United Kingdom |
| Education | Salesian College, Battersea |
| Alma mater | St Ignatius’ College |
| Occupations |
Film director, editor, film producer, screenwriter, actor |
| Years active | 1919–1980 |
| Notable work | Rebecca, Shadow of a Doubt, Notorious, Strangers on a Train, Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds, Family Plot |
List of quotes
| The more successful the villain, the more successful the picture. |
| Some of our most exquisite murders have been domestic, performed with tenderness in simple, homey places like the kitchen table. |
| Someone once told me that every minute a murder occurs, so I don’t want to waste your time, I know you want to go back to work. |
| Television has brought back murder into the home – where it belongs. |
| Television has done much for psychiatry by spreading information about it, as well as contributing to the need for it. |
| This award is meaningful because it comes from my fellow dealers in celluloid. |
| Television is like the American toaster, you push the button and the same thing pops up everytime. |
| Television is like the invention of indoor plumbing. It didn’t change people’s habits. It just kept them inside the house. |
| The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder. |
| Self-plagiarism is style. |
| The only way to get rid of my fears is to make films about them. |
| The paperback is very interesting but I find it will never replace the hardcover book – it makes a very poor doorstop. |
| There is no terror in the bang, only in the anticipation of it. |
| There is nothing quite so good as burial at sea. It is simple, tidy, and not very incriminating. |
| These are bagpipes. I understand the inventor of the bagpipes was inspired when he saw a man carrying an indignant, asthmatic pig under his arm. Unfortunately, the man-made sound never equalled the purity of the sound achieved by the pig. |
| Luck is everything… My good luck in life was to be a really frightened person. I’m fortunate to be a coward, to have a low threshold of fear, because a hero couldn’t make a good suspense film. |
| This paperback is very interesting, but I find it will never replace a hardcover book – it makes a very poor doorstop. |
| We seem to have a compulsion these days to bury time capsules in order to give those people living in the next century or so some idea of what we are like. |
| What is drama but life with the dull bits cut out. |
| When an actor comes to me and wants to discuss his character, I say, ‘It’s in the script.’ If he says, ‘But what’s my motivation?, ‘ I say, ‘Your salary.’ |
| There is nothing to winning, really. That is, if you happen to be blessed with a keen eye, an agile mind, and no scruples whatsoever. |
| Disney has the best casting. If he doesn’t like an actor he just tears him up. |
| A good film is when the price of the dinner, the theatre admission and the babysitter were worth it. |
| A lot of movies are about life, mine are like a slice of cake. |
| Always make the audience suffer as much as possible. |
| Seeing a murder on television can help work off one’s antagonisms. And if you haven’t any antagonisms, the commercials will give you some. |
| Dialogue should simply be a sound among other sounds, just something that comes out of the mouths of people whose eyes tell the story in visual terms. |
| Revenge is sweet and not fattening. |
| Drama is life with the dull bits cut out. |
| For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake. |
| Give them pleasure – the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare. |
| In films murders are always very clean. I show how difficult it is and what a messy thing it is to kill a man. |
| I am scared easily, here is a list of my adrenaline – production: 1: small children, 2: policemen, 3: high places, 4: that my next movie will not be as good as the last one. |
| I am to provide the public with beneficial shocks. |
| I have a perfect cure for a sore throat: cut it. |
| I never said all actors are cattle; what I said was all actors should be treated like cattle. |
| I’m full of fears and I do my best to avoid difficulties and any kind of complications. I like everything around me to be clear as crystal and completely calm. |
| I’m not against the police; I’m just afraid of them. |
| If it’s a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on. |
| In feature films the director is God; in documentary films God is the director. |
| I am a typed director. If I made Cinderella, the audience would immediately be looking for a body in the coach. |
| Blondes make the best victims. They’re like virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints. |
| Blondes make the best victims. They’re like virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints. |
| I’m full of fears and I do my best to avoid difficulties and any kind of complications. I like everything around me to be clear as crystal and completely calm. |
| Disney has the best casting. If he doesn’t like an actor he just tears him up. |
| Television is like the invention of indoor plumbing. It didn’t change people’s habits. It just kept them inside the house. |
| Luck is everything… My good luck in life was to be a really frightened person. I’m fortunate to be a coward, to have a low threshold of fear, because a hero couldn’t make a good suspense film. |
| Television has brought back murder into the home – where it belongs. |
| In feature films the director is God in documentary films God is the director. |
| If it’s a good movie, the sound could go off and the audience would still have a perfectly clear idea of what was going on. |
