Recurring Hitchcock – where do I begin?

Alfred Hitchcock, director at work

He’s been dead nearly thirty years now, but the man who practically invented the psychological thriller, conceived and delivered our very idea of filmic suspense, and took horror from 50’s b-grade kitsch into the realm of true terror continues to haunt the psyches of young directors hoping to emulate the master. It seems everyone from Gus van Sant (Psycho) to Anthony Perkins who played the psycho in the original and later directed Psycho III has had a go. I found a great article on /film covering the Hitchcock remake oeuvre – worth checking out.

His career spanned more than five decades, beginning in the silent era. (I wrote a piece on a couple of them last year.)

Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman star in Notorious

Yet it wasn’t until the mid 1930’s that his career kicked off with “The Man Who Knew too Much” starring Peter Lorre, but his move to Hollywood in 1939 and the gothic melodrama Rebecca that saw him begin a 25-year reign, where virtually every one of his films was a critical and popular success. He is still voted #1 director of all time in most movie polls.

If you’re curious, but don’t know which of Hitchcock’s 60+ films to begin with, here’s a good start. All of them are easily available on DVD, most with exquisite restorations. Dig in!

1. 

   Hitchcock made a cameo appearance in almost all of his films. Here he rides the bus beside Cary Grant in To Catch a Thief

   Notorious (1946)

2. Suspicion (1941)
3. Dial M for Murder (1954)
4. To Catch a Thief (1955)
5. Rear Window (1954)
6. North by Northwest (1959)
7. Vertigo (1958)
8. The Birds (1963)
9. Psycho (1960)
10. Rope (1948)

Tippi Hedren leads her young charges to safety in The Birds