Introduction: Repetition
There is no point in doing this… it has already been done a million times over.
That was my initial thought when I landed upon the notion of covering Alfred Hitchcock as my next analysis for the Reel Nerds website. It was a thought that kept this series from starting back in May.
For those who are not familiar with this (I’m assuming everyone), I recently finished covering all 60 films of Clint Eastwood (not counting the film he is currently producing just to keep that series continuing). The affair was difficult as I was still learning how to discipline myself in the matter of covering all these films and giving thoughtful observations on his career. I’m still not convinced it was as thorough as it could be, nor convinced that it lived up to the standards set by greater writers than I who have covered the careers of personalities with the finest toothed combs. Stubbornly, I decided to continue this trend on a new topic. My decision on the subject at hand had been in the back of my mind for years.
My first encounter with the Master of Suspense occurred when I was 9 years old, watching a VHS of Universals 1999 remake of THE MUMMY (dir. Stephen “Deep Rising” Sommers). Before the film began, a slew of ad’s filled the screen of a Zenith Tube TV that filled my head with the possibilities of films I had not seen but must as soon as possible. One of those ads that struck me deeply. It came after the Universal Monster ad, and in a weird way mirrored my own eventual evolution from the horrors Gothic castles and mad scientists to the horrors of man and his feasibly warped mind. It was an ad for THE ALFRED HITCHCOCK COLLECTION. Within an instance, an intense montage of imagery from the Universal owned Hitchcock films hit my feeble brain and bawled me over. The most striking was a bird darting directly at the screen and slamming into the glass of a phone booth with the impact of a bullet, the reaction of a frightened and disheveled Tipi Hedren, and a wide shot of a flock of birds chasing down screaming kids from their once peaceful schoolhouse in Bodega Bay. As the ads ended and The Mummy started, I kept remembering that image of the bird attacking the phone booth. Stuck in my head almost like a frightening dream. When I finally got a copy of THE BIRDS from the library and sat down to watch it, the VHS (as I recall) began with the trailer. But instead of clips from the film; it was just this rather large man talking cheekily granting us an orientation about how man and bird are and have been in peaceful cohabitation until Tipi Hedren runs into the room screaming, “They’re Coming! They’re Coming!”. Then as the film began, I became engrossed not just in the bird attacks themselves, but by the build up before the attacks. Every moment that Hitchcock wanted me to jump at I did without any notion of how a director plays the audience like a piano. It was simply a pure experience in cinematic terror. That was the beginning a lifelong admiration and study of Alfred Hitchcock.
Now the question is: how do you tackle a subject that has been tackled to death? Do you go through all 56 of his films (there would be 57, but THE MOUNTAIN EAGLE (1926) is a lost film that will hopefully be found and restored through the mission of the British film Institute)? Do you talk about his style and technique (there’s a whole interview book dedicated to that, called HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT by François Truffaut that is more than worth your time)? Do you discuss his personal life and dark obsession (go to ANY Hitchcock biography ever written or listen to Adam Roche’s SECRET HISTORY OF HOLLYWOOD podcast)? Essentially, do you go down any of these specific rabbit holes again?
The answer is yes, but with a caveat…
Henceforth, THE SHAMLEY SILHOUETTE is an all around celebration and study of the Master of Suspense by his admirers (and possibly even detractors). It will do its best over the course of the rest of 2019 to dig into the many different facets of Hitchcock, why we still discuss him today, and even tackle some of the Hitchcock imitations that have followed in his wake from the overt to the subtle. The articles will, in due course, eventually discuss all his films at least once and provide insights therein. My hope with this will be to encourage those reading to seek out further information and study on Hitchcock’s cinema and its vast possibilities for dissection.
In addition, I have decided that I do not wish this whole affair to be my one sided view. I want to get others in on the fun. That’s why, as each article drops, it will be followed by an audio podcast where I will sit down with fellow Hitchcock fans (and possibly detractors) to discuss their love (or even hate) of the man. With all of this we will hopefully discover, for our own purposes, a better understanding of how important his work was and how he continues to permeate the culture directly and indirectly.
Or put simply: (Sigh) Yet another analysis of The Master Of Suspense.
So get cozy for a bit guys. We are going to go where everyone has gone before… again… but hey, we’re gonna have some fun doing it…