ESSAY: Why Alfred Hitchcock Still Matters Today

Sam Shapiro taught film courses on Alfred Hitchcock at UNC Charlotte for 30 years and worked as a film archivist, among other film-related roles, at Charlotte Mecklenburg Library. He’s also co-curator of The Anticipation of Fear: Alfred Hitchcock’s Essentials, a film series that starts tomorrow at Independent Picture House. 

Below, Shapiro writes about why Alfred Hitchcock’s work remains impactful to this day before breaking down why he chose each film that will be screened during The Anticipation of Fear’s run.  

Despite having left this earth nearly half a century ago, Alfred Hitchcock’s legacy as the “Master of Suspense” holds strong in the imaginations of countless cinephiles around the world. 

Hitchcock’s work continues to feel like it exists in the present tense, inspiring, influencing and thrilling the generations of filmmakers and audiences who followed him just as it did his contemporaries. 

Many of the English filmmaker’s unique, unpredictable thrillers were considered exemplars of the suspense genre at the time of their respective releases — Psycho and North by Northwest, for example. Others such as Rope and Vertigo have accumulated status and prestige over the years, eventually recognized as influential works of cinema.

Hitchcock’s career was like no other, whether measured in longevity, celebrity or critical acclaim. In fact, one can study his filmography and watch as the major developments in 20th-century cinema play out in his work. 

Read more: Having Coffee with Sam Shapiro, Charlotte’s Hitchcock Expert

Between 1926 and 1976, Hitchcock was an industry unto himself, directing more than 50 feature films, many of which he also produced, a vast output that covered the transition from silent movies to “talkies” and black-and-white films to color. 

He had experience with movie studios and independent production. He dabbled in 3D and animation, expressionism and film noir, psychological horror and screwball comedy. He saw the enactment of the Hays Code and learned ways to work around it long enough to see its full repeal in 1966. 

Hitchcock survived the rise of television, McCarthyism and so many other factors that threatened Hollywood and, by extension, his livelihood. 

So, what is it that makes Hitchcock’s work so everlasting? Much of the pleasure that derives from watching his films is connected to the anticipation of fear. 

Referring in 1960 to the success of Psycho, as well as the critical backlash it received due to its transgressive content, Hitchcock drolly remarked, “It was intended to make people scream and yell and so forth, but no more than screaming and yelling on a rollercoaster …. So, you mustn’t go too far because you want them to get off the ride giggling with pleasure.” 

But if Hitchcock designed his films to resemble a thrill ride, the fun is how he ensured each one contained vastly different lifts, drops and hairpin turns. Rear Window and The Birds, for example, couldn’t be less alike in terms of story and characters, yet each is unmistakably the product of its creator.

Throughout his 50-year career, Hitchcock would see his thrillers become a recognizable brand, inseparable from the gallows humor and porcine silhouette of its creator. 

But as you will see from the “essentials” showcased in IPH’s series, Hitchcock never stopped evolving and innovating as an artist. Even toward the end of his long life and career (the subject of retirement was anathema to him), Hitchcock remained insatiably curious about the limitless potential of cinema.

As for us moviegoers, sitting in the dark and gazing at the screen, we love his films because of the rapture and the dread, knowing we’ll exit the ride giggling with pleasure.

Below, I break down the films that are scheduled for screenings each month from now through November, so you can have some anticipation of the fear yourself.   

Opening April 7: Strangers on a Train (1951)

A passing acquaintanceship aboard a commuter train leads to escalating acts of rage, vengeance and violence. Dare I claim that Strangers on a Train is also one of Hitchcock’s funniest films? 

Adapted loosely from Patricia Highsmith’s classic crime novel, it marked a new direction for Hitchcock of artistic independence and master showmanship. Featuring Robert Walker as the charming, deplorable psychopath Bruno Anthony, this is the perfect introduction to Hitchcock’s expertise at twisting his audience into moral knots. 

Opening May 12: North by Northwest (1959)

Cary Grant was one of Hitchcock’s favorite actors, and in their final collaboration they brought on screenwriter Ernest Lehman to help them create the quintessential Hitchcock thriller. Mission accomplished! 

As the result of a freakish case of mistaken identity, one of Hitchcock’s favorite themes, a Madison Avenue executive is sent fleeing for his life from the lounge of the Plaza Hotel all the way to the top of Mount Rushmore. One of Hitchcock’s most sophisticated, comical and genuinely suspenseful thrillers. 

Opening June 9: Rope (1948)

Rope was Hitchcock’s 34th feature film, but only his first to be shot in color — dazzling Technicolor, in fact. Based upon a sensational Broadway play in which two wealthy young men attempt to commit the “perfect murder”, Rope’s critical reputation has increased exponentially over the decades. 

Undervalued and misunderstood at the time of its release, Rope is now recognized as a technical marvel for its revolutionary use of long, unedited camera movement. It was also notable as the first Hitchcock film to feature James Stewart, who would become one of the director’s most reliable performers.

Opening July 7: Rear Window (1954)

James Stewart plays a photographer who has been forced to convalesce in his apartment due to a broken leg. This has caused him to feel increasingly bored and claustrophobic, so he begins to train his camera equipment on unsuspecting neighbors across his courtyard. 

The “we are all voyeurs” theme was one of Hitchcock’s recurring obsessions, but never more accurately conceived or visualized than in this immaculately designed murder-mystery. Produced at the apex of Hitchcock’s artistic powers and cultural celebrity, Rear Window is an indisputable masterpiece. It also stars Grace Kelly, one of Hitchcock’s favorite performers, who rises admirably to the challenge of assisting in Stewart’s mortally fraught investigation.

Opening August 11: Notorious (1946)

The present-day consensus is that Notorious, released in the immediate aftermath of WWII, was Hitchcock’s greatest achievement of the 1940s (with strong nods to Rebecca and Shadow of a Doubt). Courtesy of an indispensable script by Ben Hecht, Notorious works superlatively on two levels: as a breathlessly tense spy thriller and devastating love story. 

Much of its critical reputation is directly related to the wounded (and wounding) performances of Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman, captured by Hitchcock at the zenith of their physical beauty in glowing black and white. Notorious reminds me of the famous line from Billy Wilder’s Sunset Boulevard: “In those days they had faces. There just aren’t any faces like that anymore.” Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman had those faces.

Opens September 8: The Birds (1963)

The ads leading up to the original release of The Birds warned “The Birds Is Coming,” but audiences probably weren’t expecting a film that opened with romantic comedy and ended in avian apocalypse. Based on a story by Daphne du Maurier, this late-career venture into horror-fantasy was technically daunting and artistically risky — a challenge Hitchcock relished. 

He didn’t have the technical advantages of today’s digital wizardry, but so what? The Birds provides an instructive window into how a 1960s-era studio (Universal, in this case) could create cinema magic with innovative fakery and resourceful production design. He famously worked with Disney animator Ub Iwerks to create some of the bird-attack scenes. 

And because Hitchcock believed in anchoring his stories with emotionally complex characters, the mortal peril they faced from our feathered friends was increased to terrifying heights.

Opening October 6: Psycho (1960)

How long since you’ve checked in at Bates Motel? Time to revisit. Cabin #1 preferably, though all twelve are clean and tidy (and usually vacant). If the motel proprietor doesn’t immediately appear in the office, give your car horn a toot and he’ll be right down. 

When Psycho was released in 1960, it had a disruptive, galvanizing effect upon audiences, critics and the filmmaking industry. It seemed as if Hitchcock had released into the world a uniquely dangerous “film specimen” — one that would completely rewrite the rules for Hollywood censorship and audience expectations. 

Hitchcock later remarked “the content was, I felt, rather amusing and a big joke. I was horrified to find some people took it seriously.” 

Was Hitchcock being sincere, disingenuous or both? There have been (and continue to be) books and documentaries and college courses devoted entirely to Psycho. Horror movies and suspense thrillers from the last 60 years owe an enormous debt to this inexpensively produced, fiendishly calculated film. 

Opening November 10: Vertigo (1958)

Vertigo is visually stunning, thematically rich and uncompromisingly tragic. However, at the time of its theatrical release, it was considered a major disappointment, and Hitchcock moved on quickly to other projects. Wounded by Vertigo’s poor reception from audiences and critics alike, Hitchcock took the remarkably drastic step of permanently withdrawing it from theatrical and television distribution. (He was a great artist, but there were grudges that he nursed all the way to the grave.)

Starring his everyman James Stewart as a detective obsessed by his client’s somnambulant wife (plot descriptions of this film can be misleading), Vertigo is now recognized as the director’s most personal, if not confessional, film. And what a difference 50 years makes! Just a few years after Hitchcock’s death in 1980, Vertigo was the recipient of a major restoration, rediscovery and reevaluation. 

Suddenly hailed as Hitchcock’s greatest masterpiece, it would eventually rise — like Venus on the half-shell —to No. 1 in the Sight & Sound Critics Poll of the “Greatest Movies of all Time.” How’s that for a cinematic comeback story?

Find ticket information for The Anticipation of Fear here.