HITCHCOCK FILMS CRITICISM

Hitchcock gave people what they wanted, or rather what HE thought they wanted – to be scared and horrified. This almost means the same as saying he loved scaring people. Vincent Canby wrote in NYT on Hitchcock films and where they stand in the world of cinema and art, and what they could mean.

What do we learn from Hitchcock films?

He begins by saying Hitchcock is enough to make anyone despair! He has not learned to be serious, and his films, what do they tell us anything about the real world in which we live? Can he shed any light on the human condition, conflicts, love, environmental problems, justice, conscience, god, politics, or anything else?

They are superficial, thin, and just entertainment, to be forgotten after coming out of the theater. They lack substance. There is nothing in them for a literary critic to study.

Arrogance in Hitchcock and his films

The director is bigger than his films. His presence can be seen everywhere. He does a cameo in every second film. His actors are just paid employees. His actresses even worse. He makes films on no pretexts, does away with any real motives, and the films are not really about anything. (Mcguffin!) He has a gloomy view of the large majority of mankind, and this reflects in most of his films. He does however have extraordinary technical skills, a mastery of purely visual communication, and wit.

Meaning in Hitchcock films

Themes of rape, murder, psychopathology of the comic kind, runs and chases, innocents put up on trials, the hunt for the real villain and the final show down – these elements acquire a new meaning in Hitchcock films. They perhaps have meaning only in his films, with the visual presentation occupying a larger share of the pie than the actual actions themselves. His visual method has its own meaning.

Perhaps it is the only meaningful thing in his films. Passion as motive occurs not in his films, but shows in himself as a director. He is a master of style who transforms the commonplace into something exotic, bringing vigor into a dull and dreary routine life.

Hitchcock films: The modus operandi

Graham Greene used the term ‘entertainments’ that could be applied to his films on the whole. But which film is not one? And if Hitchcock deals with the psychopathic elements and uses normal looking people as carriers, is he too far removed from reality? His characters are caught in complex situations that do not occur in reality as they are shown, but represent the complexities of life at another level. His characters are as close to being human as in any close-to-reality film, although a bit out of tune with the normal. He tries to inject some action in the otherwise dull and dreary existence of his characters. That was his modus operandi for entertaining people.