Alfred Hitchcock once named the best movies of his career: “When suspense and melodrama combined well with character”
Although he is now considered one of the greatest directors of all time, Alfred Hitchcock was considered throughout most of his career to be a popular director, but not an artistically groundbreaking one. It would take years for his innovations as a filmmaker to be fully appreciated, and when they finally were, interviewers often treated him like a wise old sage with the keys to the cinematic universe.
It’s easy to see why. Hitchcock helped shape not only the glamour of Old Hollywood but also the techniques that filmmakers still use. The dolly zoom, the MacGuffin, and the mechanics of suspense were all developed by the Psycho director and his collaborators, and they continue to be prevalent in modern cinema.
Throughout his career, Hitchcock made some of the most iconic movies ever released, including North By Northwest, Vertigo, Psycho, and The Birds. Most film fans would struggle to name their top five Hitchcock films, let alone their top two, but the Master of Suspense had no trouble doing so. In a 1969 interview with the BBC, the Master of Suspense opened up about his career, and when he was asked to name the films he was most proud of, he didn’t hesitate.
“Two films,” he said. “The first was called Shadow of a Doubt, which I wrote with Thornton Wilder. This was one of those rare occasions when suspense and melodrama combined well with character. It was shot in the original town, and it had a freshness.”
He continued: “The other film is Rear Window, which is the most cinematic film I have made. Most people don’t realise this because the man is in one room, in one position. But, nevertheless, it’s the montage and the cutting of what he sees and its effect on him that creates the whole atmosphere and drama of the film.”
1943’s Shadow of a Doubt is an often overlooked Hitchcock movie, arriving between his first foray into Hollywood with Rebecca and his breakthrough to another level of stylised suspense and glamour with Notorious and Strangers on a Train. It stars Teresa Wright as a teenager in an idyllic suburban town who is overjoyed when her beloved uncle (Joseph Cotten) comes to stay. Soon, however, she begins to suspect that he might be an infamous serial killer that the police are hunting. It’s one of the director’s best films during this period, turning the idealised version of the American suburbs into a nightmare.
Rear Window hardly needs an introduction. It stars Jimmy Stewart as a photographer who is stuck in his apartment after breaking his leg and finds himself spying on his neighbours with a telephoto lens. When he sees a man murder his wife, he puts himself and his partner (Grace Kelly) in danger. As Hitchcock noted, the film is a striking feat of cinema.
Set entirely in the main character’s apartment, it often feels claustrophobic but never limited. By highlighting the daily routines of the people who live across from the main character, as shown through his lens, we get a voyeuristic pleasure out of knowing them at their most candid.
Many films have tried to recapture this cinematic device, including Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom, Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blow Up, and, more recently, the 2021 erotic thriller The Voyeurs. However, Rear Window remains the gold standard, a technical achievement that never detracts from the narrative.
