Original subtitles

♪♪

♪♪

[ Dark luminous music plays ]

Elvis Mitchell: Alfred Hitchcock,

the director once said,

I want to be remembered as a man

who entertained millions through the technique of film.

Hitchcock, or Hitch,

as his friends and family called him,

is probably on the very short list

of the most recognizable directors of cinema.

He had a specific style and explored themes repeatedly,

but through different stories and characters,

and he knew how to market himself.

Many classic actors are identifiable through films

they made with Hitchcock,

and even when talking about composer Bernard Herrmann,

for instance, he is immediately connected to Hitchcock.

As years go by, however,

there's a tendency to only focus

on a handful of his films,

but by looking at his filmography,

one gets an overview of Film History.

He started during the silent era

and found himself at the junction

when sound appeared with a film called "Blackmail."

"Blackmail," 1929,

is significant in so many ways.

It marks a transition from one technology to another,

and shows Hitchcock embracing sound in a compelling

and experimental way.

[ Screams ]

Then there are so many themes in the film itself

and of the titles surrounding it

that are part of Hitchcock cinema.

While "Blackmail" was already Hitchcock's 10th

fully completed feature film,

it is one that can be seen not only as one of his best,

but also one that developed further the director's style

and his singular cinematic eye...

[ Dish clatters ]

...and ear.

[ Birds chirping ]

"Blackmail,"

and those very early films

mark in many ways,

the birth of the Hitchcock touch.

[ Projector whirring ]

[ Suspenseful music plays ]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[ Tense music plays ]

"Blackmail" is the story of a young woman,

Alice White, Anny Ondra, who murders an artist.

Crewe, Cyril Ritchard, in self-defense.

She is blackmailed by a man named Tracy, Donald Calthrop,

who saw them together,

but is protected and ultimately saved

by her fiancé,

Frank Webber, John Longden,

the detective in charge of the case.

Alice.

Lock that door.

"Blackmail," the play by Charles Bennett,

starred Tallulah Bankhead, in the lead role of Alice.

It premiered at London's Globe Theater in 1928

and was directed by Raymond Massey,

himself an actor.

Bennett said that the road began with Hitchcock attending

a performance of the play one night,

and then asking to meet Bennett.

He plainly announced he wanted to make this into a movie.

Bennett answered, "Talk to my agent about it."

And so he did.

On "Blackmail," Bennett didn't adapt his play.

Alfred Hitchcock gets credit on the film's adaptation

with Benn Levy for the dialogue,

for the sound version.

"Blackmail" began as a silent movie.

And as talking pictures appeared.

Hitch had to deliver a sound version of the film.

Sorry, sir. Full up.

We have more room upstairs.

Go on.

I think I told you there's more room upstairs.

Sorry, sir. Full up here. More room up

Hey!

Both the silent and the sound version

were eventually released.

It's interesting to mention

that most Hitchcock films were based on existing material.

Novels,

short stories,

and plays.

There are few original screenplays.

"North by Northwest," for instance,

was an original script by Ernest Lehman,

another screenwriter with whom Hitch had a strong relationship.

In fact, Ernest Lehman once said,

"You realize very early on when you're working with Hitch

that you're writing for a star.

And that star is Alfred Hitchcock."

John Michael Hays also wrote four screenplays for Hitchcock.

And Alma Reville, Hitchcock's wife,

greatly contributed to everything Hitch did.

Man: Don't be silly, Alice.

Alice: Let me go!

Let me go!

[ Straining, grunting ]

[ Typewriter clacking ]

Mitchell: The writing in his films was essential,

and was one of the most important elements

in the success of Hitchcock pictures.

[ Typewriter clacking ]

"One of my biggest problems is writing,

and that is why I can't make films more often,"

Hitchcock declared.

He also admitted with a wink,

"But of course I need writers.

I am a visual man,

but unfortunately, I must also have delineation

of character and dialogue.

The plot I can depict,

but I must have characters and good dialogue."

The first play that Hitch adapted was "Downhill" in 1927,

followed that same year by "Easy Virtue,"

based on the great Noel Coward effort,

and "The Farmer's Wife" in 1928.

Even though it was all dialogue,

Hitchcock did his best to make that film as visual as possible.

[ Lighthearted music plays ]

And have as few title cards as possible.

♪♪

♪♪

[ Lighthearted music fades ]

This was good training ground for "Blackmail."

"Blackmail" was advertised as

"The first British sound feature length film."

John Maxwell, the producer of "Blackmail,"

set up a temporary sound-stage studio

with RCA material imported from the United States.

During the transition between silent and sound,

films were advertised as part sound films.

They had been shot silent,

but only the last reel had sound.

Well, here we are.

I'm right up there. Top.

It seems that during the production of "Blackmail,"

there would be a sound version.

In fact, the silent version was released

after the talkie version of "Blackmail."

Good evening, Miss White. How are you?

I'm alright, thanks.

I haven't seen you for a long time.

Therefore, while shooting

the silent version of "Blackmail,"

Hitchcock was thinking sound.

That's right.

Well, I must push along.

Good night.

Good night. Good night, Frank.

Well, dear.

[ Pensive music plays ]

The first part of "Blackmail"

practically remains a silent film.

No dialogue, pure visuals showing detectives on the case.

[ Pensive music continues ]

There's an interesting shot of the bad guy reading a newspaper,

Hitch would reproduce a near similar shot,

in "Shadow of a Doubt."

The camera moved to a mirror,

again, a shot that Hitch reprized

many years later in "Topaz."

The scene in Scotland Yard

with the different stages of the villain's arrest

is rich with details.

[ Dramatic music plays ]

It's almost like watching a documentary.

♪♪

Hitchcock will film Henry Fonda's arrest

in "The Wrong Man" in 1957,

in a similar documentary approach

detailing the steps of the arrest.

The film was also based on a true story.

"Blackmail" is full of innovations,

but that was also true of "The Ring,"

which the director called "a Hitchcock picture"

had a scene where our protagonist,

an up-and-coming boxer, Jack Saunders,

imagines having to leave his wife behind

whilst he goes on tour.

Look at how Hitch materializes Jack's fear and suspicion

towards his wife's interest in another man.

What could happen if he left them alone?

[ Jazzy music plays ]

"Champagne" was very much a comedy

with some interesting visual gags.

A drunk man on a ship.

When the ship is steady, he is barely on his feet.

When the ship is rocking, he is steady.

There's also food being served,

where Hitch shows it as a mess in the kitchen,

and how it eventually reaches a table looking appetizing.

Among those early titles,

you find the seed of some of Hitch's later films.

The state fair in "The Ring" is echoed

in "Stage Fright" and "Strangers on the Train."

The POV of a man drinking from a glass in "Champagne"

can also be found in "Spellbound."

The slapstick comedy in that same film

is present in another Hitchcock comedy.

"Mr. & Mrs. Smith."

the historical setting of "Juno and the Paycock"

is in "Foreign Correspondent,"

"Saboteur" and "Lifeboat," for instance.

a costume ball party in "Rich and Strange,"

is like in "To Catch a Thief."

For $9,000.

Once... [ Gavel bangs ]

twice...

[ Gavel bangs ]

the third and last time.

[ Indistinct chatter ]

There's an auction scene in "The Skin Game,"

just like in "North by Northwest."

Auctioneer: $22.50 once.

$22.50 twice.

Last call.

$1,500.

There are many more examples

underlining that the Hitchcock sensibility

was already forming,

not only during those early years,

but in films that are way different from the ones

that he would become most known for.

We meet Anny Ondra.

Now, uh, Miss Ondra,

you asked me to let you hear your voice

on the talking picture. [ Chuckles ]

But, Hitch, you mustn't do that.

Why not?

Well, because I can't speak well.

Do you realize a squad van will be here any moment?

No. Really. Oh, my gosh. I'm terribly frightened.

Why? Have you been a bad woman or something?

Well, not just bad. But, er...

But you've slept with men?

Oh, no! [ Laughs ]

You have not? Come here. Stand in your place.

Otherwise it will not come out right,

as the girl said to the soldier. [ Laughing ]

That's enough.

[ Laughter ]

Anny Ondra, who plays Alice White,

a prophetic name, as in "Alice in Wonderland,"

or so she thinks,

but instead falls into a rabbit hole

and gets involved with Murder.

In white, but first shown dressed in black,

although after her ordeal at the end,

dressed in bright colors, ready to start over.

[ Gentle music plays ]

Anny Ondra, whose real name was Anna Ondráková,

was German and Czech.

She also starred in "The Manxman," released in 1929,

which Hitchcock directed a few months before "Blackmail."

"The Manxman" was Hitch's last silent movie before "Blackmail,"

which included some interesting shots.

But Ondra's career in England was killed

when the talkies came in.

She returned to Germany and appeared in a few films,

and then retired after marrying prizefighter Max Schmeling.

Michael Powell, who later became writer,

director, producer of films such as...

...began his career at British International Pictures.

"Although I was head of the stills department,"

Powell wrote in his autobiography,

"It was agreed by Hitch and me

that I should personally shoot all stills on his pictures.

I went down to Elm Street to see him.

He was shooting extra sound scenes

between Anny Ondra and Cyril Ritchard,

her seducer in the film.

Anny had a Czech accent you could cut with a knife.

So Hitch had hired a bright young actress,

Joan Barry,

to speak Anny's cockney lines off camera

while Anny mouthed them in front of the camera.

It was a mad idea, but it worked.

Unless you know that fact, the switch is seamless."

Oh no, I don't think so.

Besides, I have to go home soon.

I see it.

Michael Powell continues,

"Hitch was listening to the scene

on a dead set of earphones.

He waved to me and I waved back,

And then I looked around.

Where was Jack Cox, the director of photography?

Where was the soundproof camera?

I edged carefully around the set

to where the camera was presumably hidden,

and found it in a sort of sweat box

which contained the camera and the whole camera crew."

By the way, Ronald Neame,

the director of "The Poseidon Adventure,"

among others, was assistant cameraman

on "Blackmail."

Visuals and camera movements

were always important to Hitchcock.

"I don't decry dialogue," Hitch once said,

"but I feel that technique is not necessarily cinematic."

He told French filmmaker Francois Truffaut

for the iconic interview book "Hitchcock/Truffaut"

that to him, silent movie-making

was the purest form of cinema.

But that didn't stop Hitch from experimenting.

In "Murder!," at one point,

Herbert Marshall is shaving, listening to the radio.

He has a stream of consciousness monologue,

something quite novel at the time.

Had to drink a drop of brandy.

For that scene,

Hitch had an orchestra playing music live,

but off screen.

[ Orchestral music playing ]

I'm sure I was right when I raised that point,

and I feel more certain now.

How did we know that someone else didn't drink the brandy?

Perhaps there was someone else.

That's the whole thing.

Whoever drank that brandy

[ Knock on door ]

Alice is one of Hitchcock's complicated blondes.

She starts off as one of Hitchcock's

strongest female characters.

I must be getting home.

You are frightened?

I'm certainly not.

Take more than the man to frighten me.

Yeah. [Chuckles] That's what I thought.

She is in love with her boyfriend Frank,

but is bored with him

and wants to explore other potential,

namely an artist.

She lies to Frank and hooks up with a guy.

What happens next is literally a journey

to get her to realize that Frank is the right man for her.

You find that theme throughout the Hitchcock oeuvre.

For example, in "Stage Fright," Eve, played by Jane Wyman,

falls in love with a detective

while trying to prove that a man she loves is innocent of murder,

but is in fact a killer.

"Blackmail" also announces more directly

Hitchcock's "Dial M for Murder,"

based on a hit play by Frederick Knott,

in which Tony Wendice, Ray Milland, arranges the murder

of his adulterous wife, Margot, Grace Kelly.

But when the killer strikes

attempting to strangle his victim,

Margot grabs a pair of scissors and stabs the man in the back.

A scene reminiscent of "Blackmail,"

in which Anny Ondra stabs the man

who is trying to rape her.

[ Gasping ]

You think Margot is lucky to have escaped murder,

but things turn against her

when her liaison with Mark Halliday,

Robert Cummings, surfaces.

The husband made it look like the killer

was blackmailing Margot.

She loses the sympathy of the jury

and is condemned to death for murder.

The detective in charge, John Williams,

is skeptical, however, and with Mark's help

manages to prove Margot's innocence.

Like Anny Ondra's own journey in "Blackmail,"

what is memorable about Grace Kelly

in "Dial M for Murder" is her transformation

throughout the film.

We'd better drop in here first and have a drink.

Mitchell: She goes from glamorous and sexy

to vulnerable and defeated.

What's the matter with me, Mark?

I don't seem able to feel anything.

Hitchcock did a masterful job making

making a seemingly unsympathetic character

she is, after all, cheating on her husband

completely sympathetic.

The audience roots for her even before we find out

the husband's murderous intentions.

Many years later, the consequence of impulse

like Alice's own desire to hook up with Crewe,

the artist in "Blackmail"

would be deadly for Janet Leigh in Hitchcock's "Psycho."

There is a blonde who would change the face

of thrillers and cinema altogether.

There are many other blondes in Hitchcock's films,

but truly, the impulsive one started with "Blackmail."

Alice and Frank go to Lyon's Corner Hall,

a popular spot in London.

It's a fascinating scene to watch.

There, something happened that shows

Hitchcock's brilliance at setting things up.

Frank,

I've lost one of my gloves.

I think I left it at the other table.

[ Indistinct chatter ]

[ Laughter ]

[ Indistinct chatter continues ]

[ Mid-tempo orchestral music playing ]

Is this it?

Yes, thanks.

Hm, thought so.

There's a hole in two fingers.

Would you like a pair of nail scissors for Christmas?

Funny, aren't you?

And later, she loses her glove again

at the home of the man she kills.

It's the perfect payoff when Frank finds the glove

when investigating the murder.

[ Dramatic musical sting ]

He knows it was her.

On one hand, by keeping the evidence,

he is protecting her.

On the other, Alice becomes, in a way,

his prisoner forever,

since he is the only one who knows the truth.

In "Blackmail,"

Hitchcock makes his cameo appearance

on a subway train sitting behind John Longden,

who is across from Anny Ondra.

Hitchcock had appeared in a silent thriller, "The Lodger,"

in 1926, three years before "Blackmail."

"It all started with a shortage of extras in my first thriller,"

Hitchcock once said.

"I was in for a few seconds as an editor

with my back to the camera.

It really wasn't much, but I played it to the hilt.

Since then, I have been trying to get into

every one of my pictures.

It isn't that I like the business,

but it has an impelling fascination that I can't resist.

When I do it, the cast,

the grips and the cameramen, and everyone else gather

to make it as difficult as possible for me.

But I can't stop now."

Hitchcock said, regarding his cameo roles,

that he tried to keep those roles as short as possible

so that he wouldn't have to suffer the indignity

of being an actor any longer than necessary.

He also liked to get this gimmick over with

early in his films,

so that the audience wouldn't just sit there looking for him.

[ Train whistle blows ]

Hitchcock like trains.

[ Train engine chugging ]

He appeared on a train in "Shadow of a Doubt."

He's playing cards with another passenger.

He is coming out of a train station with Gregory Peck,

in "The Paradine Case,"

and trying to climb aboard a train holding

holding a cello case in "Strangers on a Train."

[ Bell clanging ]

Menier: It's proving astonishingly difficult

to find the right person for one particular part.

Might I ask you to stand up for one moment?

The really frightening thing about villains

is their surface likableness.

Menier: You know Bennett, he looks it.

He looks it quite perfectly.

Exactly what I've been thinking, Sir John.

An Agatha Christie type character

in Hitchcock's "Suspicion" says

about the villains in her mystery novels...

I was completely fascinated by the way your villain

My villain? My hero you mean.

I always think of my murderers as my heroes?

That quote seems to parallel Hitchcock's own approach

to the bad guys in his films.

I'm afraid you're wasting your time.

You see, she can neither here nor speak.

"I always make my villains charming and polite,"

the director said.

Do you mind?

Hmm?

Hands up.

"It's a mistake to think

that if you put a villain on screen,

he must sneer nastily, stroke his black mustache,

or kick a dog in the stomach.

Some of the most famous murderers in criminology,

men for whom arsenic was so disgustingly gentle

that they did women in with a blunt instrument,

had to be charmers to get acquainted with the females

they eventually murdered."

Will you search this gentleman?

I take it you've no objection.

I don't mind.

In "Blackmail," Hitch said that the shadow

to suggest a mustache on the artist's face

was his farewell to the silent films.

Hitchcock was a master at making his villains

almost as charming as his heroes.

They all seem to possess a sense of humor,

and though their view of the world was sinister,

they kept smiles on their faces.

I'm so sorry, Sir John.

I'm afraid I understand so little about playwriting.

I always think a girl knows instinctively

when she can trust a man.

Yes, of course she does.

Do you trust me...Alice?

In "Blackmail," there are, in essence, two villains,

Crewe, the artist, truly a champagne villain,

And Tracy the blackmailer, a sleazy type.

This again will become a bit of a staple for Hitch.

Look at "Dial M" suave Ray Milland,

the mastermind behind the attempted killing of his wife

and the creepy henchman he hires,

played by Anthony Dawson.

Another example might include Mr. Krug

from "Foreign Correspondent."

Krug has a sketchy history,

as revealed by the scar on his neck

hidden under his turtleneck sweater

versus Stephen Fisher, played by Herbert Marshall,

who never gets his hands dirty.

Marshall had also appeared in "Murder!"

in a much more likable role.

Also think of silky James Mason

versus his dedicated-to-a-fault subordinate

played by Martin Landau in "North by Northwest."

Rotten.

[ Laughing ]

Never mind.

We'll finish this masterpiece together.

That's the idea.

Art and framing take a special place

in Hitchcock's body of work.

[ Dark luminous music plays ]

The painting of a court jester

is a very important image in "Blackmail."

[ Laughing ]

Hitchcock, himself a great appreciator of art and fashion,

had an eye for paintings in his work.

Think about a few examples

a painting of Carlotta Valdes

and the self-portrait that Midge does

of herself in "Vertigo" later.

The portrait in "Rebecca,"

or the one done by Bruno's mom in "Strangers on a Train."

The painting of Joan Fontaine's father in "Suspicion,"

or the painting in the hallway

that an inspector looks at enigmatically

in a separate scene.

The bird stuck on a painting in "The Birds."

John Forsythe is a painter in "Trouble with Harry,"

and Hitch collaborated with Salvador Dalí

to visualize the dream sequence in "Spellbound."

In "Blackmail," the court jester painting

makes a big statement until the end of the film.

There.

Oh!

You are awful.

[ Chuckles ]

In the scene where Crewe asks Alice to change,

Hitchcock uses almost a split screen device.

The artist playing the piano on one side

while we're put in the position of a voyeur,

with Alice undressing on the other.

Voyeurism would be a central theme

to "Rear Window," for instance,

where Jimmy Stewart uses a camera

to look across at his neighbors.

In "Blackmail,"

Alice goes from black, possibly woman in control,

to white, pretty much hinting

at a virginal, untouched look.

♪ Prove unpleasant for the latter ♪

The camera is telling two stories.

Anny Ondra is nervous

while Cyril Ritchard is getting excited.

The soundtrack tells us the third story through music.

♪ Miss Up-to-Date ♪

The song describes the situation

in the most literal sense,

"Miss Up-to-Date" about a wild,

pretty, and naughty girl meeting an awful fate.

♪ They say you're wild ♪

♪ A naughty child ♪

♪ Miss-up-to-date ♪

♪ For whom if you predict ♪

♪ For you an awful fate ♪

The song sets the stage for what's about to happen.

But look at the difference between the silent version

and the sound version of that same scene.

And that's a song about you, my dear.

[ Chuckles ]

You haven't said how you liked it.

It's quite a lesson on how Hitchcock adapted

to this new revolutionary technique.

Wait a minute.

Where is this trouble?

This scene, which was probably quite shocking at the time,

introduces yet another theme

that preoccupied Hitchcock's characters

Sex.

[ Gentle music plays ]

"My attitude towards sex,"

Hitchcock said, "is the same as it is

to other aspects of my work

'understatement' all the time.

I'm not a believer in hanging sex all over women.

It should be discovered in the story."

This quote applies perfectly to what is happening here

between Anny Ondra and Cyril Ritchard.

Hitchcock didn't have complete nudity in his films

until "Frenzy" in 1972.

However, he shocked the nation in 1960

when he showed Janet Leigh in her sexy bra in "Psycho."

And used that image for the poster of the film.

This is one of the scenes that Hitchcock had to reshoot

For the sound version of "Blackmail."

[ Gentle music swells ]

At the Lincoln Center tribute for Alfred Hitchcock,

Cyril Ritchard recalled that in that scene,

mics were hidden all over the set."

[ Up-tempo piano tune playing ]

"And I had to talk into the first one

and then another as I walked about,

sometimes having to pause in mid-sentence..."

That's an idea.

"...while I walked out of the range

of one microphone into the second."

Let's see it on you.

"I thought that Anny and I

were getting a little glazed from shooting

the scene so many times.

It turned out that Hitch had substituted

real gin in our glasses."

Oh, it's so strong.

"To give the scene a bit more 'vitality.'"

[ Up-tempo piano music plays ]

There it is.

[ Up-tempo playing continues ]

[ Discordant final note play ]

We are now reaching the turning point in our story

as the curtain rises on murder.

Hitchcock had different ways of killing his victims in movies...

[ Sinister music plays ]

...mainly strangulation and stabbing,

like in "Blackmail."

[ Sinister music continues ]

Other killings with knives or sharp objects

are featured in the following films

In "Murder!," a woman was killed with a pointy fire poker.

In "The 39 Steps," a spy is stabbed in the back.

[ Gasps shakily ] [ Groans, gasps ]

In "Sabotage," Sylvia Sidney kills her husband

with a kitchen knife.

In "Dial M for Murder,"

Grace Kelly kills her assailant with a pair of scissors.

In "Rear Window,"

a man cuts up his wife with sharp instruments.

[ Sinister music continues ]

In the second version of "The Man Who Knew Too Much,"

released in 1956,

a man is stabbed in the back.

In "North by Northwest,"

a man at the United Nations is also stabbed,

but in "Torn Curtain,"

a knife fails to kill an East Berlin security officer.

And of course, in "Psycho"...

[ Screams ]

...Janet Leigh and Martin Balsam

are both stabbed to death in two separate scenes.

[ Sinister music continues ]

Don't be silly, Alice.

Like he did with nudity,

Hitchcock was careful to use violence

in the best possible taste.

Alice: Let me go! Let me go!

"People ask me constantly," Hitchcock declared,

"Why are you so interested in crime?

The truth is, I'm not.

I'm only interested in that it affects my profession."

At the same time, the director,

who was born in England

and lived there a good part of his life,

acknowledged that crime had always been an English passion.

[ Alice grunting ]

Visually, Hitchcock filmed murders with style.

"Blackmail" is no exception,

but it happens behind a curtain.

"Blackmail" is also self-defense,

as we will see again in "Dial M for Murder."

[ Dark, gloomy music plays ]

Ondra delivers a brilliant performance

through attitude and body language.

♪♪

Look at how she strikes the painting laughing at her.

[ Canvas rips ]

She breaks the fourth wall in the same way

that Norman Bates would in "Psycho"

as she walks towards us.

[ Dark, gloomy music continues ]

Hitchcock dissolves from a close up of Ondra's face

to a long shot of the studio.

While the dissolve technique is typically used to indicate

to the audience a time lapse.

Here there is no disruption of the temporal continuity.

Look at a freeze frame of Ondra's face in the dissolve,

and compare it to that of Norman Bates at the end of psycho.

The effect and resulting subliminal image you get

are almost similar.

♪♪

Hitchcock's brilliant visual storytelling is in full swing

as she is drifting, following the killing.

[ Melancholy music plays ]

♪♪

Everything reminds her of it.

♪♪

In a similar way, Hitchcock will express

Jimmy Stewart's vertigo literally.

In "Marnie," she's afraid of red,

and we see it.

[ Frantic music plays ]

Here, he gives us more visual information

that reflects Anny Ondra's own state of mind.

She's dizzy and confused.

Hitchcock used some interesting visual associations

to convey Alice's state of mind.

Film historian Gene D. Phillips points this out

in his book on Alfred Hitchcock that analyzes imagination.

[ Horns honking ]

The cocktail shaker on the scene

suddenly turns into a phallic knife,

stabbing at the first syllable of the word "cocktail,"

leaving no doubt about the link between the lethal weapon

that Alice employed to defend her purity,

and the sexual weapon Crewe had intended to use on Alice.

[ Suspenseful music plays ]

The director's understanding of sound, music,

visuals is masterful,

and is in contrast by the following segment,

which is pure silent movie.

The dissolve at the door is another reminder

that Alice has a dream-like relation to time.

[ Suspenseful music continues ]

Just when we think that Alice is safe,

the shadow of the blackmailer appears.

And of course, this creates suspense.

According to Hitchcock,

the essential element of suspense

was always to let the audience know more than the hero.

Let them know that there is a bomb under the character's seat.

Let them suffer as they see the characters of the drama

grope for solutions they already know.

"It was much easier,"

Hitchcock said regarding the silent era.

"There were no nuances of dialogue to be concerned with,

and the acting was much more elemental.

The whole atmosphere was more relaxed."

For instance,

there's an interesting scene in "The Farmer's Wife"

that underlines this point.

Unable to find a wife,

the protagonist of the story stares at an empty chair.

Ghostly images of women he met appear.

Then...

[ Romantic music plays ]

...the woman he loves comes and sits,

and he realizes she is the one.

[ Romantic music fades ]

In "Murder!," a couple comes to meet Sir John

and to convey the fact that they're intimidated...

How do you do, Mr. Markham?

As a man advances towards him,

Hitchcock had him on something soft.

Probably a mattress of some kind rather than a hard floor.

How do you do, Sir? Why don't you sit down?

After the murder,

Hitchcock explains visually

that Alice is now in a trance.

[ "Miss Up-to-Date" tune plays hauntingly ]

The music on the soundtrack is the slow version

of the song Cyril Ritchard was playing on the piano

before his death.

Hitchcock understood perfectly

the importance of music in film.

He uses the "Miss Up-to-Date" tune here as a cynical touch.

It's as if he's saying to us, "See, I told you so."

[ Suspenseful music plays ]

Here is a great use of sound.

Alice is roaming the streets.

She sees a man asleep in a corner.

His hand reminds her of the man she killed.

[ Screams ]

Then we cut with a scream to the landlady,

finding the victim's body.

Hitchcock also used sound to mark a narrative transition,

as in the case of "The 39 Steps."

In that film, a landlady finds a corpse of a woman.

[ Woman screams, train whistle blares ]

We immediately cut the loud whistling

of a train leaving the station,

and on board is Richard Hannay,

the man who will be wrongly accused of the crime.

In "Young and Innocent," two women discover

the lifeless body of a victim washed ashore

as they're about to scream...

[ Seagulls squawking ]

...Hitchcock cuts to the sound of seagulls above,

an ominous foreshadowing of "The Birds,"

where Jessica Tandy, who played Rod Taylor's mother,

goes to visit a neighboring farmer.

She enters his house, notices that all the cups

that hang on hooks in the kitchen have been broken.

She goes towards the bedroom and finds the poor man dead.

The instinct here would have been to have her scream,

but Hitchcock knows better.

Instead, she runs out of the house,

completely unable to make a sound.

[ Muted scream ]

It's as if the scream is strangled in her throat.

And it is we in our seats who want to scream,

because the absence of it on the soundtrack is so potent.

What do you think?

There's been a murder last night around the corner.

Another use of sound in "Blackmail"...

And they tell me the police are round there now.

...of a bird chirping allows Hitch to play up

the contrast between Alice's internal world,

the trauma she suffered,

and the otherwise innocent world that surrounds her.

[ Bird chirps merrily ]

And all that,

under the watchful eye of her boyfriend Frank,

a framed photo of him on her wall.

[ Suspenseful music plays ]

Because Hitchcock had started making movies

in the silent era,

there was a sense that he understood to a greater degree,

perhaps over directors who came afterwards,

the potential power of a soundtrack.

But the pièce de résistance,

the true mark of Hitchcock genius,

and his understanding of sound takes place over breakfast.

A good clean, honest whack over the head

with a brick is one thing.

There's something British about that.

But knives...

The news of the crime is everywhere.

Alice is at a table and is asked to cut a slice of bread

while a neighbor, or maybe she's just a regular customer,

tells everyone present about the murder,

but all we hear is each time

the woman says the word "knife."

...knife. Man: Alice cut us a bit of bread, will you?

The rest of her dialogue is purposely garbled.

[ Muffled speech ] ...knife.

The poor girl responsible for the killing

is hesitant in handling the knife.

[ Muffled speech ] ...the knife...

[ Muffled speech ] ...musn't use a knife!

[ Knife clatters ]

And eventually drops it

when the neighbor delivers

one last and loud "knife."

Man: Really you ought to be more careful.

You might have cut somebody with that.

[ Suspenseful music plays ]

Mitchell: But now, observe the same scene

in the silent version.

[ Suspenseful music continues ]

♪♪

[ Suspenseful music swells ]

♪♪

[ Suspenseful music fades ]

Hitchcock's manipulation of the word knife

in the talkie version

announces other important sounds in Hitch's films.

Like in both versions of "The Man Who Knew Too Much"...

[ Scream echoes ]

...the unforgettable scream.

[ Blood-curdling scream ]

[ Cymbal crashes ]

...meant to prevent an assassination.

Screams, of course, are trademark of anything scary.

[ Curtain rattles ]

[ Screaming ]

As is the anticipation of the scream in "Frenzy,"

as a secretary returns to her office.

But Hitchcock keeps his camera outside on the street.

[ Footsteps receding ]

We know she is about to discover

that her boss has been strangled.

We wait...

and wait until, to our great relief,

we hear the horrifying scream.

[ Blood-curdling scream ]

But Hitchcock sometimes used prosaic sounds

to provide suspense,

as in an amazing sequence in "Torn Curtain,"

when Paul Newman, aware that he is being followed,

tries to lose his tail by going into a museum.

Hitchcock in that scene

creates a score using only footsteps...

[ Footsteps tapping ]

...sounding against the marble floors of the galleries.

[ Footsteps tapping ]

The pacing of the sound alone

is what drives the action and suspense.

Later silence is as important

when Newman is forced to kill Gromek,

Wolfgang Kieling,

an East German security officer who is onto him.

The murder takes place in a kitchen

and in order to not alert the taxi driver waiting outside...

[ Cabinet clatters ]

[ Windows clatter ]

...Newman tries his best to keep the man from screaming.

He and a woman end up dragging Gromek on the floor

and shoving his head inside a gas oven.

[ Both panting ]

[ Gromek groaning ]

It's really the struggle to keep the man silent

that creates the suspense.

Well did anyone else enter the house that night?

Ad lady says not.

Girl says not.

They were alone.

That's right.

All: Any answer to that, Sir John?

Mitchell: There's also a similar approach to sound in "Murder!"

See the cadence in that scene.

But no one else could have done the murder.

'Cause they were alone.

Says they quarreled.

Admits it.

That's right.

All: Any answer to that, Sir John?

She does not admit it.

She says she doesn't remember.

A totally abstract approach

that takes full advantage of what sound offered

to filmmakers like Hitch.

Man: And not against all of us.

Man #2: Make an exhibition of yourself.

Man #3: Waste of time.

Woman: Waste of my quality brandy.

Man: Hands all over blood.

All: Any answer? Any answer?

Any answer to that, Sir John?

I hope you don't mind if I have something to eat,

but I'm rushed today.

[ Plucky music plays ]

Hitchcock's greatest preoccupation

was food.

"Cinema is not a slice of life.

It's a piece of cake," Hitchcock said.

Food plays an important part in many Hitchcock films.

In "Blackmail," Alice and Frank

had their argument at a restaurant.

Alice killed Crewe with a knife

that was placed next to a loaf of bread.

The news of the murder takes place at the breakfast table,

and later the blackmailer will conduct his business over food.

"A few years ago in Santa Rosa, California,

I caught a side view of myself in a store window

and screamed with fright,"

Hitchcock once said about his rather corpulent figure.

[ Plucky music continues ]

"Since then,

I limit myself to a three-course dinner

of appetizer, fish, and meat

with only one bottle of vintage wine

with each course."

On another occasion, he said,

"It's been my observation

that a man does not live by murder alone.

He needs affection, approval, encouragement,

and occasionally a hearty meal.

[ Plucky music continues ]

Food was as abundant in his films

as it was on his table.

The Hitchcocks would, in fact,

bring their own cook to Hollywood.

[ Plucky music continues ]

This fascination with food made it to the screen.

Hitchcock loved to show his characters eating

and discussing food,

but his own commentary on the subject was best.

This applied to both his culinary predilection

as well as his preference for visuals revealing seduction,

marriage, relationship and murder,

you know, appetites.

[ Plucky music continues ]

His gastronomic sensibility also extended

to the graphic nature of violence,

as evidenced in his observation that,

"There will obviously be a lot of drama

in the steak that is too rare."

Mmm!

Best meal I've tasted for ages.

[ Utensils clatter ]

[ Man slurping noisily ]

[ Boat creaking ]

[ Slurping continues ]

[ Creaking continues ]

[ Slurping continues ]

In "Rear Window,"

Grace Kelly is bringing food to Jimmy Stewart.

Ah.

Her way of suggesting he should marry her.

There is a similar scene in "Notorious"

where Ingrid Bergman invites Cary Grant for dinner,

hinting at how wonderful it is to eat in style...

I've decided we are going to eat in style.

Marriage must be wonderful with this sort of thing

going on every day.

...and hinting at a married life.

But it's also over food that in "Rear Window,"

Stewart and Thelma Ritter discuss murder

and the neighbors across the way.

Since we haven't witnessed any crime,

the only reaction we get

from the gruesome speculative details

spilled out by Thelma Ritter...

That's the only place

where we could have washed away the blood.

...is through watching Jimmy Stewart lose his appetite.

The most celebrated line about food

in a Hitchcock film may be in "To Catch a Thief"

when Grace Kelly innocently, or perhaps not so,

asked Cary Grant over a picnic basket...

You want a leg or a breast?

You make the choice.

A similar conversation is featured between Eva Marie Saint

and Grant in "North by Northwest,"

as he sits across from her in a dining car on a train,

and she declares that she never discusses love

on an empty stomach.

I never discussed love on an empty stomach.

You've already eaten.

But you haven't.

When they're kissing later in the train compartment

their exchange has to do with

Cary Grant having taste in food, clothes, and women.

Same taste and women.

"Rope" is completely centered on a meal served on a chest

in which a murder victim is hidden.

Placing candlesticks on the chest,

one of the killers proudly observes

that they suggest a ceremonial altar from which the guests,

including the family, friends and girlfriend of the dead man,

will be eating our sacrificial feast.

I think they suggest a ceremonial altar,

which you can heap with the foods for our sacrificial feast.

Later on, it is mentioned that Farley Granger's character,

the other killer, is quite good at "strangling chickens."

A discussion of death and murder

takes place at the table in "Suspicion,"

"Strangers on a Train," and others, including "Frenzy,"

in which the wife of the detective

in charge of the necktie murders experiments with

mostly repulsive-looking nouvelle cuisine

throughout the film,

adding a layer of humor...

It's delicious.

...to the progress of the investigation.

But I find the...

ingredients are somewhat mystifying.

The killer Bob Rusk, played by Barry Foster,

works at a fruit market

and hides one of the bodies in a potato bag.

He later has to retrieve a piece of evidence,

his tie pin,

which the victim grabbed when she was being strangled.

And of course, food is on the menu in "Psycho."

You never did eat your lunch, did you?

I better get back to the office.

These extended lunch hours

give my boss excess acid.

From the first scene

where Janet Leigh and John Gavin

meet to have sex during her lunch hour,

to her last meal with Norman Bates,

a simple sandwich and a glass of milk

during which he observes...

You...You eat like a bird.

You know, of course.

In "Rebecca," Mrs. Danvers terrorizes

the second Mrs. de Winter...

I'd like to know if you approve of the menu.

...by asking her to fill in blank spaces on the menu

with suggestions for sauces.

I've left a blank space for the sauce.

In "The Paradine Case," Lord Horfield,

played by Charles Laughton, observes on one hand

that Ann Todd is very appetizing.

You look very, very appetizing.

She replies in fashion...

Charming compliment

from such a gourmet as yourself,

Lord Horfield.

Part of the plot of the second version

of "The Man Who Knew Too Much"

unfolds in a restaurant in Morocco,

with Jimmy Stewart being unable to eat the local food properly.

Hitchcock declared he hated eggs.

No surprise, then, in "To Catch a Thief,"

that Jessie Royce Landis

puts out a cigarette in an egg dish.

Not literally.

There's also a suggestion in "The Birds"

that birds are getting their revenge on mankind

because we've been eating them.

His trailer for "The Birds"

began with Hitchcock eating chicken.

I've come to feel very close to the birds,

and I've come to realize how they feel when...

[ Quizzical music plays ]

I don't think I'll eat just now.

Hardly proper with all of you here.

Mitchell: Similarly, he introduced "Frenzy"

by standing in front of a bag of potatoes.

And the horrors of vegetables.

I've heard of a leg of lamb,

a leg of chicken,

but never a leg of potatoes.

[ Jaunty music plays ]

The examples of food in Hitchcock's films go on.

the systematic and almost compulsive inclusion

of something as common as food in cinema

was, on Hitchcock's part,

another device to engage his audience

with his plots and characters,

A way to wet our appetite

and keep our attention to alert and on edge.

A way to keep us wanting more, coming back,

and asking for seconds.

[ Jaunty music crescendos and ends ]

Perhaps it's rather fortunate

that your little secret,

uh, only came into the hands

of a man like me.

Do you know there are some men

who would make money out of a thing like that?

What a chance for blackmail.

Tracy, the blackmailer here is played by Donald Calthorpe,

who was mainly a stage actor

and whose film appearances were usually as villains.

Calthorpe worked with Hitchcock on three other films

"Elstree Calling,"

"Murder!,"

and "Number Seventeen."

Michael Powell recalled in his autobiography,

"Hitch had already decided that Donald Calthorpe,

a complex and brilliant actor, would play the blackmailer.

Calthorpe came of a famous and gifted theatrical family.

He despised films but liked money.

Opinions that are often combined in the superb piece

of screen acting.

I looked everywhere for that...

other glove last night.

But of course, you detectives are better trained

at finding these things.

For fun, look at the way Hitchcock frames the actors

and how there's an ad that spells out "sex to come."

Clearly a reference to what led to this situation.

Calthorpe is not the only blackmailer in Hitchcock films.

The standouts would be Ray Milland,

who blackmails a man into killing his wife

in "Dial M for Murder."

There's blackmail in "I Confess,"

in Strangers on a Train,"

or even in "Rebecca" with the line...

Blackmail is not much of a profession.

[ Dark luminous music plays ]

John Longden, who was a British leading man

in the early '30s

and who played the role of Frank,

had this to say about his experience on "Blackmail."

"I don't remember any feeling

that it was an historical occasion."

Like Cyril Ritchard,

John Longden had a difficult time adjusting

to the microphones and the new sound techniques.

He said, "Besides tending to produce a crick in my neck,

it hardly contributed to the smooth portrayal of my part."

But this is not the only Hitchcock film

in which a detective chooses love over duty.

Why didn't you tell me?

In "Sabotage," Sylvia Sidney kills her husband

with a kitchen knife over dinner.

Only a detective who was in love with Sylvia Sidney

knows of the crime.

As she is about to confess to the police...

He's dead.

[ Bomb explodes ]

...a bomb then destroys her home

along with the evidence of her crime.

Rather unfortunate,

the way that poor man round the corner

er, died last night.

During the whole confrontation with the blackmailer...

Perhaps it's fortunate...

...Alice is nervous, but Frank defends her.

That a suspicious looking man

with a criminal record

was seen hanging around.

What's interesting in "Blackmail"

is that the story swerves

from the detective's ethical choice

of apprehending the culprit...

Don't you try and swing this thing on me.

That won't get you anywhere.

...to protecting her instead.

Frank even goes further by implying

to shift the blame to a person who did not commit the crime.

Rather unfortunate that Scotland Yard are at present

looking for that man.

The blackmailer is dodgy and has a criminal background,

but he did not kill the artist.

In this he is innocent.

But that doesn't stop Frank.

[ Tense, dramatic music plays ]

Hey!

The chase of the villain

and the climax at the British Museum

is pure Hitchcock.

The villain gets to the top of the museum.

It's not me you want. It's him.

Ask him!

Why his own

[ Glass shatters ]

And eventually falls through the roof

into the galleries below.

The fall in "Blackmail" is echoed

in "The Man Who Knew Too Much" at the Royal Albert Hall,

Mount Rushmore in "North by Northwest,"

The Statue of Liberty in "Saboteur,"

The mission in "Vertigo,"

Even in "Murder!"

the killer,

realizing that he has been revealed,

hangs himself during a circus act.

[ Crowd screaming ]

The chase is an essential element

in many Hitchcock movies.

Hitchcock developed his taste for chase scenes,

mainly through books.

"I have derived more from novelists like John Buchan,

J.B. Priestley,

John Galsworthy,

and Marie Belloc Lowndes

than from movies," Hitchcock said.

"I like them because they use multiple chases

and a lot of psychology.

My chases are the result of using all of the resources

of modern film technique,

combined with what I got from these novelists."

[ Train engine chugging ]

For Hitchcock, in the ideal chase structure,

the tempo and complexity of the chase

is an accurate reflection of the intensity

of the relations between the characters in "Blackmail."

[ Dramatic music continues ]

"The chase is the ultimate payoff in many ways,"

Hitchcock said.

"The chase makes up about 60% of the construction

of all movie plots.

[ Dramatic music fades ]

"When it came to the chase through the streets,

I broached an idea that had been maturing for a while."

Michael Powell said,

"Hitch, don't let's do an ordinary chase

through the streets like you did in "The Lodger."

"Let's take it into some bizarre location

that is entertaining in itself.

I had been thinking of my visits

to the British Museum reading room

to see my grandfather

and the impression that he had made upon me

by his bent figure at the desk,

dwarfed by the height of the shelves

and topped by the glass dome over the whole vast room."

Michael Powell continues,

"Let's have him slip into the British Museum at night,

get chased through the rooms full of Egyptian mummies

and Elgin marbles,

climb higher to escape and be cornered,

and then fall through the glass dome of the reading room

and break his neck."

Hitch, being a Londoner, of course,

had never been near the British Museum reading room,

but he saw the possibilities of the idea.

And so I think I can make a modest claim

to being the inventor of the Hitchcock climax,

unveiled to the world

through the chase in 'Blackmail.'"

Unfortunately, Hitchcock was not allowed

to shoot that scene in that way.

Hitchcock used many trick shots in "Blackmail,"

especially during the sequence at the British Museum.

"We used the Schüfftan process

because it wasn't enough light in the museum to shoot there,"

Hitchcock told Francois Truffaut.

For "Blackmail," the producers knew nothing about

the Schüfftan process,

a technique that consisted of covering

part of the camera's view with a mirror

and allowed to assemble an image from multiple parts.

And there was a fear they might have raised objections.

It was all done without their knowledge.

In fact, John Maxwell, the producer of "Blackmail,"

thought that the shooting of the visual effects

would delay the production and put the film over budget.

While he was doing the visual effects,

Hitchcock set up a camera on the sidelines,

photographing a letter for an insert

in case someone from the production office

showed up uninvited.

When Maxwell saw the film, he was totally surprised.

Framing the story around a specific place

was a clever way to engage audiences

with the characters.

In "Saboteur,"

the fact that the climactic confrontation

between the hero and the villain took place

on top of the Statue of Liberty,

tied in with the plot,

which revolved around traitors and, in essence,

the fight for freedom.

In "North by Northwest,"

that very same type of confrontation

takes place on top of Mount Rushmore,

also a fitting location

since the movie is about government secrets.

"Stage Fright" is about travesty.

The villain is an actor and plays the role of the victim

quite convincingly.

He is in fact a psychotic killer.

Therefore, dramatic art plays center stage in the story.

[ Dramatic music continues ]

Key elements of "Secret Agent" take place in Switzerland,

so Hitchcock stages a scene inside a chocolate factory.

The beginning of "Foreign Correspondent"

is set in Holland,

so Hitchcock playfully uses windmills

as a plot device.

Other monuments indelibly identified

with Hitchcock's cinema

include the Royal Albert Hall for both versions

of "The Man Who Knew Too Much."

The Tower Bridge in "Frenzy,"

and the Golden Gate Bridge in "Vertigo."

Real cities like Bodega Bay in "The Birds"

are also as iconic as the films themselves.

[ Dramatic music ends ]

Hello!

It isn't very often I see you so early in the day is this.

Call to see Frank?

No.

I want to see Inspector Wald, please.

In "Blackmail," Alice wants to confess.

Well, I suppose you're going to tell him who did it, miss.

Hitchcock here carefully designed how she looks.

Yes.

She is dressed in bright colors.

No longer the black outfit from the beginning.

[ Solemn music plays ]

Costumes would very much be a part

of the Hitchcock language.

"Vertigo" being possibly the extreme

as it was part of the plot.

I better say what I have to say now.

Ironically, as Alice is about to confess...

What I wanted to say is that

[ Telephone ringing ]

I was the one. One moment, please.

...the phone rings.

In a way, Alice,

Just like the film itself is saved by sound.

Yes. Hold on. You deal with this young lady.

I should be busy for a minute.

Cinema wins.

Yes, sir.

The phone ringing allows Frank

to take Alice out,

saving her from telling the truth.

And to let people think that Tracy,

the blackmailer, was in fact, the killer.

Aha! So you found him, miss.

Did she tell you who did it?

Yes.

You want to look out.

Or you'll be losing your job, my boy.

[ Laughter ]

it's an ironic twist,

and perhaps even a life sentence.

Would she really wanted to stay with this man

under normal circumstances?

But what choice does she have?

Hitchcock declared that he originally wanted

another ending for "Blackmail."

He said after the chase and the death of the blackmailer,

the girl would have been arrested

and the young man would have had to do the same things to her

that we saw in the beginning.

Handcuffs, working at the police station, and so on.

Then he would see his older partner in the men's room,

and the other man, unaware of what had taken place,

would say, "Are you going out with your girl tonight?"

And he would have answered, "No, I'm going straight home."

And the picture would have ended that way.

But the producers claimed it was too depressing.

In the play,

it was revealed that the artist had a heart condition,

died because of it, and had fallen on the knife.

We've seen the painting of the jester

on several occasions throughout the film.

When Alice entered the artist's studio,

she looked outside the window and saw a policeman.

She then looked at the painting and laughed.

The traditional court jester was hired to ridicule society.

Alice identified with the painting

when she laughed at the policeman

because in fact she was laughing at Frank.

After the murder,

Alice tore up the painting as she realized

that the accusatory finger of the jester

was pointing at her all along.

[ Mocking laughter echoes ]

But who is the jester laughing at now at the end of the film?

At the irony of Alice's situation,

at love, at authority?

Maybe he's laughing at us

the audience.

[ Mocking laughter continues ]

The irony in the ending was also a Hitchcock trademark.

The ironic conclusion of "Murder!"

where what drove the killer to kill

was to protect a secret from his paramour.

A murder on an impulse

to silence the mouth of a woman

who knew his secret

and was going to reveal it to the woman

he dared to love.

There is a melodrama for you, Sir John.

The same secret she already knew from the beginning.

Other ironic endings can be found in "Frenzy"

"Mr. Rusk, you're not wearing your tie."

Mr. Rusk,

you're not wearing your tie.

"To Catch a Thief"

"Oh, mother will love it up here."

So this is where you live.

Oh, mother will love it up here.

[ Ominous music plays ]

Or "Strangers on a Train"

"Aren't you Guy Haines?"

[ Whimsical music playing ]

I beg your pardon,

but aren't you Guy Haines?

A question that set the plot into motion

at the very beginning of the film.

[ Suspenseful music plays ]

"Blackmail" was publicized as the first British talkie.

Michael Powell wrote,

"It was a smash hit

and put Hitch on the top of the heap."

All the atmosphere and suspense of "The Lodger,"

plus a few clever tricks with sound,

the film had all the visual appeal of a silent film,

plus the suspense.

When the film reached Hollywood,

Hitch was deluged with offers,

but he wasn't ready to go yet.

[ Uplifting instrumental music plays ]

"I think that somebody once said to me,"

Alfred Hitchcock declared,

"'What's your idea of happiness?'

And I said, 'A clear horizon.

No clouds, no shadows, nothing.'"

This remark is quite unexpected, coming from someone

who left behind such a legacy of moving images.

But rather, what Hitch may have meant here

is his idea of happiness was a blank screen

on which he could create his own images.

And with "Blackmail," and those early films,

Hitch, it seems, legitimized sound,

but also made a giant step for motion pictures.

[ Uplifting music continues ]

He went on to have one of the most amazing cinematic careers,

and it's those early films that set the tone

and connect all the films Hitch did subsequently.

[ Uplifting music continues ]

You have the blonde...

the wrong man or woman...

villains...

detectives...

the chase...

the humor...

the food...

spies...

voyeurism...

suspense...

sexuality...

murder.

[ Uplifting music continues ]

The singular cinematic language

and the MacGuffin,

the thing that motivates the plot

but is of no importance.

Very few filmmakers can claim to be a brand name.

Hitchcock was, is, and always will be a brand.

[ Uplifting music swells

[ Music fades ]

[ Pensive music plays ]

Francois Truffaut said, "When I direct a movie,

I realized if I'm having problems with a scene,

I always find a solution

if I think of Hitchcock."

[ Music continues ]

No doubt most filmmakers are indebted to Hitchcock,

and as audience members, so are we.

To paraphrase Truffaut,

If you're having problems with a film you're watching,

you can always find solace in revisiting a Hitchcock movie.

No doubt it will remind you

how far reaching the art of cinema can be.

♪♪

[ Dark luminous music plays ]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪