Alfred Hitchcock on Cinematic Style

The Lodger (Directed by Alfred Hitchcock)

The audience's emotions are central to Hitchcock's narrative universe; these feelings are evoked through "gripping situations" which are derived from the film's basic framework, in which language plays a limited role. Hitchcock's use of language is often confined to serving the plot, and he writes the script in partnership with his selected screenwriters. The scriptwriter can use a variety of visual tactics to develop a character:

[...] in particular the use of things. This is one of the ingredients of true cinema. To put things together visually; to tell the story visually; to embody the action in the juxtaposition of images that have their own specific language and emotional impact - that is cinema. [...] Things, then, are as important as actors to the writer. They can richly illustrate character”

This narrative style was a feature of the silent film, going back to the films of D.W. Griffith, and is the era in which Hitchcock learned his craft, but was unfortunately passed over in favour of the theatrical and dialogue with the advent of the sound film. From then on, relying on dialogue became the standard practice. But according to Hitchcock, the experienced screenwriter knows how to make effective use of non-verbal elements: things and objects, in the film, instead of falling "into the uncinematic habit of relying too much on dialogue".

Of course, Hitchcock understood that the modern film cannot simply eliminate the need for dialogue. You cannot shoot a modern motion picture only in pictures. So Hitchcock settles on a compromise: "Therefore the skilled writer will separate the two elements. If it is to be a dialogue scene, then he will make it one. If it is not, then he will make it visual, and he will always rely more on the visual than on dialogue". 

‘The silent pictures were the purest form of cinema’ - Alfred Hitchcock

It is important to remember that Hitchcock began his career in the era of silent movies. His first nine films as director - between 1925 and 1929 - were all silent, and even his first sound film, ‘Blackmail’ (1929), was begun as a silent, and was released in silent and sound versions.

The limitations of the silent form led filmmakers to develop a visual language to enable them to say with images what they could not using dialogue or sound. By the time of the arrival of sound in 1927 (later in Europe) this filmmaking language had become so sophisticated that sound was felt by some to be almost unnecessary. Others - including Hitchcock - felt that the arrival of sound meant that something was lost to cinema. Directors were no longer forced to tell a story using images alone, and cinema's distinctively visual storytelling suffered as a result.

Throughout his career, Hitchcock continued to believe in cinema as a visual medium. For him, dialogue and sound should remain secondary to the image in telling the story. This is not to say that he was completely uninterested in dialogue - he worked with many fine writers, and many of his films have excellent dialogue sequences. But it's true that when we think of Hitchcock we tend to remember images - the shower scene in ‘Psycho’ (1960) or the handcuffed Robert Donat and Madelaine Carroll in ‘The 39 Steps’ (1935) - rather than lines of dialogue.

“When we tell a story in cinema, we should resort to dialogue only when it's impossible to do otherwise. I always try first to tell a story in the cinematic way, through a succession of shots and bits of film in between" 

The limitations of silent cinema meant that directors were forced to be imaginative in using images to convey dialogue and effects. The use of 'intertitles' allowed some dialogue and exposition (setting the scene), but it was generally felt that too many intertitles interfered with the action. After the release of the German director F.W. Murnau's ‘Der Letzte Mann’ (‘The Last Laugh’, Germany, 1924), which used no intertitles at all, many felt that a 'pure' cinema should be able to do away with dialogue altogether, and convey everything with images alone.

Let’s look at one example of how the early Hitchcock uses visuals for emotional effect. Hitchcock’s ‘The Lodger’ (1926) concerns a Jack the Ripper-style serial killer at loose in a fog-bound London. The presence of a mysterious stranger in a lodging home creates suspicions among the occupants. Hitchcock wanted to highlight how the lodger's pacing up and down in his room affects the other inhabitants in the room below in one scene. In a sound film we could just hear the lodger's footsteps while watching the reactions of the other occupants.

Hitchcock came up with an innovative solution. He set up a glass floor and filmed the lodger (Ivor Novello) walking back and forth from below. Hitchcock achieves a more interesting and powerful effect than he could have achieved with sound by superimposing this shot over one of the ceilings - with the swaying chandelier further emphasising the force of the lodger's steps - and intercutting between this image and the reaction of the family below. 

The director's efforts are directed at the impression created on the movie audience. Each shot is a statement made with the intention of eliciting an emotional response, of effecting the audience's state of mind, of feeling. That is, the visual has a direct effect on the emotions. Occasionally, the director wants to just please the eye with his visual presentation; other times, he wants to produce a powerful impression on the audience. Thus, the filmmaker exposes his style via his management of all these narrative options. And style is important. Perhaps the most crucial and unique characteristic of a filmmaker is his or her style. This style is evident in both the topic he/she chooses and the method in which he/she directs it. Significant directors are well-known for their aesthetics. 

And Hitchcock is unmistakably known for his intensely personal style, as François Truffaut put it in the introduction to his famous interview with Hitchcock: “Because he exercises such complete control over all the elements of his films and imprints his personal concepts at each step of the way, Hitchcock has a distinctive style of his own. He is undoubtedly one of the few filmmakers on the horizon today whose screen signature can be identified as soon as the picture begins.”

According to Hitchcock, some filmmakers are more concerned with honing their style and handling of the material than with discovering new subjects. They are primarily concerned with the way in which they deliver their stories – a phrase that accurately describes Hitchcock's cinematic technique. He is a filmmaker of narratives who is interested in conveying stories in his own unique way.

For more on this aspect of Hitchcock see the full article from the BFI Screenonline: ‘Hitchcock’s Style’.

North By Northwest (Directed by Alfred Hitchcock)

In the following extract from an interview with Hitchcock in 1963, the great director discusses his prioritisation of cinematic style over content.

H: Let me say this to you. I put first and foremost cinematic style before content. Most people, reviewers, you know, they review pictures purely in terms of content. I don’t care what the film is about. I don’t even know who was in that airplane attacking Cary Grant. I don’t care. So long as that audience goes through that emotion! Content is quite secondary to me.

I: Now is this a philosophical viewpoint? ... Or is this something that just happened, like the man who makes cartoons likes to make people laugh?

H: Well, I believe this. I believe we still have in our hands the most powerful instrument, cinema, that’s been known. I know of no other medium where on a given night in Japan, in Germany, in Paris, and in London and in New York, the different audiences of different nationalities can be shocked at the same moment at the same thing on that screen. I don’t know of any other medium. The theater? How far does that get? It never gets to Japan. Well, by God, you go outside of a movie on The Ginza, and you will see a great big head of Hitchcock up there. Because they think so much of the director with oriental eyes! Really! Yes! But this is my point when you say what do I enjoy? I enjoy the fact that we can cause, internationally, audiences to emote. And I think this is our job.

I: As an entertainer? As a creator?

H: As an entertainer. As a creator. What is art? Art is an experience, isn’t it? You know? Now the art of the talking picture, I think, belongs to the theater. You see, the only thing wrong with silent pictures was that sound never came out of the mouths. But unfortunately, the moment sound arrived, all these horrible commercial people rushed to the theater, and borrowed from the theater. And they are still doing it today. I’ve done it myself! They say “Will you make a film of Dial M For Murder?” I say O.K., all right. But I refuse to open it up like they do in the movies. I said it’s nonsense. What do you do? When you take a stage play, I said? What do you call opening it up? The taxi arrives, we have a long shot of the street. The taxi stops at the front door of the apartment house. The characters get out, cross the sidewalk, go into the lobby, get into an elevator, go upstairs, walk along the corridor, open the door, and they go into a room. And there they are, on the stage again. So, you might just as well dispense with all that, and be honest and say it’s a photographed stage play and all we can do is to take the audience out of the orchestra and put them on the stage with players.

Dial M for Murder (Directed by Alfred Hitchcock)

I: You didn’t do this completely though. In Dial M?

H: Yes, and I’ll tell you why. Because I’ve seen so many stage plays go wrong through opening up, loosening it, when the very essence is the fact that the writer conceived it within a small compass.

I: But you would still treat it cinematically?

H: Within its area. If I can. As much as I can.

I: Do you design each production? Design each film in advance completely? With drawings, and ...

H: Yes, Psycho, yes, to some extent with drawings, but you see Psycho was designed, first of all to lead an audience completely up the garden path. They thought the story was about a girl who stole $40,000. That was deliberate. And suddenly out of the blue, she is stabbed to death. Now, a lot of people complained about the excessive violence. This was purposely done, because as the film then proceeded, I reduced the violence while I was transferring it to the mind of the audience. By that first impact, so the design of the film was very clearly laid out. So that that audience, by the time we got toward the end when the girl was going over the house, wandering, they didn't particularly care who she was ... They will yell LOOK OUT! when a burglar is going around the house. They will still have the same fear of being caught or being attacked or what have you. So, I was transferring by establishing the violence strong in the beginning and then got less and less violent as the film went on, thus letting their minds carry. That’s what the pattern of the film was. The pattern of The Birds was deliberately to go slow. And with an unimportant kind of relationship.

I: This has been highly criticized by some critics.

H: I deliberately made it slow.

I: You deliberately made it slow?

H: Oh, no question about it.

I: But it was still — to me, interesting.

H: But the point is, that’s where the critics were wrong, you see, because the effect on an audience isn’t there unless I’ve made them wait deliberately and gone slow.

I: This is timing?

H: This is truer timing. Well, it's just like designing composition in a painting. Or balance of colors. There is nothing accidental, there should never be anything accidental about these things. You’ve got to be very clear in what you are doing and why you're doing it. You know, for example, I think it was the New Yorker once — they don’t review pictures. They don’t review them, they make jokes about pictures anyway. They always have a man who’s supposed not to like the movies — But they had the ridiculous effrontery to say a picture like North by Northwest was unconsciously funny. You know. They really did. Or, Hitchcock is doing a parody of himself Of course, I’m doing it with the tongue in cheek. Psycho was the biggest joke to me. I couldn’t make Psycho without my tongue in my cheek. If I’d been doing Psycho seriously, then it would have been a case history told in a documentary manner. It certainly wouldn’t have been told in terms of mystery and oooooh, look out audience, here comes the bogey man! This is like telling a story to a little boy. It’s like telling a fairy story. You tell it in hushed tones: ‘Ssh! and then the woman went up the stairs!’ That’s all I’m doing. And you’ve got to have a sense of humor to do this.

The Birds (Directed by Alfred Hitchcock)

I: In The Birds then, there is really no — what you would call theme or message ?

H: All you can say about The Birds is nature can be awful rough on you. If you play around with it. Look what uranium has done. Man dug that out of the ground. The Birds expresses nature and what it can do, and the dangers of nature, because there is no doubt if the birds did decide, you know, with the millions that there are, to go for everybody's eyes, then we'd have H. G. Wells’ Kingdom of the Blind on our hands.

I: I think you took advantage of a natural human trait though, that when, say uranium, or the Bund movement in the ‘30s, or the plague in the medieval times starts to descend upon a given group of people, they don’t want to believe it. They fight against it.

H: Well, or they're helpless with it. You see, the idea of the people in the house, when the birds are attacking and not knowing what to do ... I only had the shutter blow open and the young man try to close the shutter, to tell the audience what it was really like outside. Otherwise, I was asking too much of their imagination. So, I gave them a little sample: White shadows go for his hand ... bloody it up. I'm saying ‘Audience, that's what it's really like outside.’ Only by the millions, not just two, as I’ve just shown. Now the helplessness of the people is no different in that sequence than people in an air raid with nowhere to go. Now, that's where the idea came from. I've been in raids ... in London and the bombs are falling, and the guns are going like hell all over the place. You don't know where to go. Where can you go? Can't go down to the basement. That's kind of sissy, you know.

I: I see ... So you’re just caught.

H: You’re caught! You’re trapped!

– Extract from “Cinema (1963) - Hitchcock on Style: An Interview with Alfred Hitchcock”. Reprinted in Hitchcock on Hitchcock: Volume 1 (1995) edited by Sidney Gottlieb.