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Despite preliminary work, it was never filmed. Hitchcock's health was declining and he was worried about his wife, who had suffered a stroke. The screenplay was eventually published in Freeman's book The Last Days of Alfred Hitchcock (1999). [227]
In 1948, Hitchcock directed Rope, which starred James Stewart. The film was his first in Technicolor and is remembered for its use of long takes to make the film appear to be a single continuous shot. [10] Three years later, he directed Strangers on a Train (1951).
YearTitleCredited As(producer)Credited As(writer)1922NoNo1925NoNo1926NoNo1927NoNoAug 20, 2024 · Hitchcock decides to show us the location of the man via an elaborate and lengthy crane shot, swooping over the reception, the restaurant, and right up to the drummer's face where the twitch is clearly shown. What did you learn from the video? Let us know in the comments. Source: The Discarded Image.
- Overview
- Motion Pictures. Film Production
- The screenplay
- Direction
Five years after his Psycho forever changed perspectives on taking a shower, the legendary film director and “master of suspense” Alfred Hitchcock shared his knowledge in the 14th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. His discussion of film production was first published in 1965 as part of a larger entry on motion pictures written by a collection...
By far the greater majority of full-length films are fiction films. The fiction film is created from a screenplay, and all the resources and techniques of the cinema are directed toward the successful realization on the screen of the screenplay. Any treatment of motion-picture production will naturally and logically begin, therefore, with a discuss...
The screenplay, which is sometimes known, also, as the scenario or film script, resembles the blueprint of the architect. It is the verbal design of the finished film. In studios where films are made in great numbers, and under industrial conditions, the writer prepares the screenplay under the supervision of a producer, who represents the budgetary and box-office concerns of the front office, and who may be responsible for several scripts simultaneously. Under ideal conditions, the screenplay is prepared by the writer in collaboration with the director. This practice, long the custom in Europe, has become more common in the United States with the increase of independent production. Indeed, not infrequently, the writer may also be the director.
In its progress toward completion, the screenplay normally passes through certain stages; these stages have been established over the years and depend on the working habits of those engaged in writing it. The practice of these years has come to establish three main stages: (1) the outline; (2) the treatment; (3) the screenplay. The outline, as the term implies, gives the essence of the action or story and may present either an original idea or, more usually, one derived from a successful stage play or novel. The outline is then built up into the treatment. This is a prose narrative, written in the present tense, in greater or less detail, that reads like a description of what will finally appear on the screen. This treatment is broken down into screenplay form, which, like its stage counterpart, sets out the dialogue, describes the movements and reactions of the actors and at the same time gives the breakdown of the individual scenes, with some indication of the role, in each scene, of the camera and the sound. It likewise serves as a guide to the various technical departments: to the art department for the sets, to the casting department for the actors, to the costume department, to makeup, to the music department, and so on.
The writer, who should be as skilled in the dialogue of images as of words, must have the capacity to anticipate, visually and in detail, the finished film. The detailed screenplay, prepared ahead, not only saves time and money in production but also enables the director to hold securely to the unity of form and to the cinematic structure of the action, while leaving him free to work intimately and concentratedly with the actors.
Unlike the screenplays of today, the first scripts had no dramatic form, being merely lists of proposed scenes, and their content when filmed was strung together in the order listed. Anything that called for further explanation was covered in a title.
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Film direction was born when for the first time a man held a motion-picture camera and turning it on his friend said, “Do something.” This was the first step in creating movement for the camera. To create things that move for the camera is the aim at all times of the storytelling director.
Documentary direction is different. Its directors are primarily editors or, rather, discoverers. Their material is provided beforehand by God and man, noncinema man, man who is not doing things primarily for the camera. On the other hand, pure cinema has nothing in itself to do with actual movement. Show a man looking at something, say a baby. Then show him smiling. By placing these shots in sequence—man looking, object seen, reaction to object—the director characterizes the man as a kindly person. Retain shot one (the look) and shot three (the smile) and substitute for the baby a girl in a bathing costume, and the director has changed the characterization of the man.
It was with the introduction of these techniques that film direction departed from the theatre and began to come into its own. Still more is this the case when the juxtaposition of images involves a noticeable change, a striking variation in the size of the image, the effect of which is best illustrated by a parallel from music, namely in the sudden transition from a simple melody played on the piano to a sudden burst of music by the brass section of the orchestra.
The essence of good direction then is to be aware of all these possibilities and to use them to show what people are doing and thinking and, secondarily, what they are saying. Half the work of direction should be accomplished in the script, which then becomes not merely a statement of what is to be put before the camera but in addition a record of what the writer and the director have already seen as completed on the screen in terms of fast-moving rhythm. This, because it is a motion picture that is visualized and not a play or novel—an adventure carried along by a central figure. In a play, the action is moved forward in words. The film director moves his action forward with a camera—whether that action is set on a prairie or confined to a telephone booth. He always must be searching for some new way of making his statement, and above all he must make it with the greatest economy and in particular the greatest economy of cutting; that is to say, in the minimum of shots. Each shot must be as comprehensive as a statement as possible, reserving cutting for dramatic purposes. The impact of the image is of the first importance in a medium that directs the concentration of the eye so that it cannot stray. In the theatre, the eye wanders, while the word commands. In the cinema, the audience is led wherever the director wishes. In this, the language of the camera resembles the language of the novel. Cinema audiences and readers of novels, while they remain in the theatre or continue to read, have no alternative but to accept what is set before them.
Then comes the question of how they are to see what they are shown. In a mood of relaxation? Not relaxed? It is how the director handles his images that creates the state of mind, of emotion, in the audience. That is to say, the impact of the image is directly on emotions. Sometimes the director goes quietly along in a mood of simple, normal photography, and the eye is pleased as it follows the story. Then suddenly the director wishes to hit hard. Now the pictorial presentation changes. There is a bursting impact of images, like a change in orchestration. Indeed, orchestration is perhaps the best simile for film, even to the parallel of recurrent themes and rhythms. And the director is, as it were, the conductor.
Given the skill that permits a man to direct, skills shared in varying degrees, perhaps the most significant and individually important thing about a director is his style. The style is evidenced by both his choice of subject and his manner of directing it. Important directors are known for their style. The record speaks of Ernst Lubitsch as having a style characterized by cinematic wit, or the pictorial quip. Charlie Chaplin is spoken of as having a style, and it is interesting to notice that it was his incursion into dramatic direction in A Woman of Paris that seemed to crystallize this style.
2 days ago · First films. Hitchcock’s first film as a director was the comedy Mrs. Peabody (1922; also called Number 13), which was not completed, for lack of funding. His first released film was Always Tell Your Wife (1923), which he codirected with its star Seymour Hicks, but he did not receive credit.
- Michael Barson
Apr 13, 2023 · Alfred Hitchcock is one of the most iconic filmmakers of all time, and his unique style of filming has had a lasting impact on the world of cinema. Hitchcock’s films are known for their suspenseful plotlines, intense character development, and masterful use of camera angles and techniques.
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Sep 3, 2023 · Alfred Hitchcock was a master of editing and cutting film. One technique he mastered was the "point of view" shot that allowed audiences to see the film through a character's eyes. In Rear Window , Hitchcock ensures that his POV shot remains aligned with Stewart's eye line.
