August 1, 2025
Experiencing Hitchcock:
How to Enjoy Fully the Films of the Greatest Filmmaker
By Emanuel Levy, Ph.D.
What could be said about Alfred Hitchcock that has not been already said in the 200 books and thousands of articles written about him (my rough estimate).
In the 1960s and 1970s, the emergence of influential theories of spectatorship and representation have led to reevaluation of Hitchcock’s work, resulting in numerous essays, manuscripts, books, monographs about individual works (Psycho, Vertigo) as well as entire career and life.
My proposed book, Experiencing Hitchcock: How to Enjoy More Fully the Work of the Greatest Filmmaker, strives to achieve two different, yet interrelated goals.
First, it aims to help viewers to enjoy more fully and thoroughly–experience rather than just watch or see–the movies of the most famous director in the world by using basic theories and concepts of film studies.
Second, the book aims to show how Hitchcock’s long career (half a century) and his huge oeuvre (53 features) have in turn helped the development or sharpening of basic film theories, such as feminism, semiotics, structuralism, reception/reading theories, etc.
The 16 chapters in this book are arranged in a manner that reflects the evolution of film studies.
While each chapter provides an extended look at some particular Hitchcock movies. all the chapters include make references to the filmmaker’s other works.
Each discussion also explores the potential of particular films for critiquing diverse dimensions of the ever-changing commercial cinema as well as film theories.
Obviously, films can be approached from different theoretical perspectives. My goal is to provide diversity of ways–theoretical and pragmatical–of experiencing movies actively rather than just watching them passively.
The challenge is to create and to promote a more energetic and immersive experience of Hitchcock’s half-a-century cinema, 53 films made between 1925-1976
While each chapter provides in-depth discussion of a particular theory or perspective, the overall organization of chapters facilitates comparisons of Hitchcock’s various films.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Ch. 1: Hitchcock, Film Theory, Film Studies
The mergence of new theories in the 1970s ad 1980s, and their relevance to better and deeper understanding of Hitchcock’s work.
Ch. 2: Hitchcock’s Career (1925-1976)
Career Analysis
Beginning, length, ups and downs, highs and lows, film output
Reputation Building
Ch. 3: Hitchcock, Politics, and Ideology
The Director in British and American Society
Sociological Perspective
Hitchcock and Reflection Theory
Readings of Hitchcock’s texts, by placing them in the broader socio-cultural-political contexts, from his early work in 1925 Germany, through the late 1920 and 1930s in the U.K., his main career in the U.S. from 1940-1976, all yhe way up to his death, in 1980.
Ch. 4: Hitchcock and the Studio System
Organizational View
Hitchcock’s career in Germany, Britain, and Hollywood
First under contract to David O. Selznick, who “imported Hitchcock from the U.K.: Rebecca, in 1940, was their first, ultra-successful, collaboration
Hitchcock as an independent producer-director, working f0r various studios (Warner, Universal, etc).
Ch. 5: Hitchcock and his Movie Stars
The Star System
Actors in Hitchcock’s work in Britain Vs. Hollywood (mainstream and otherwise)
How he used and promoted the existing star system, casting established stars, such as Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, and Ingrid Bergman, all frequent actors in his oeuvre.
And also, how he helped making new stars, such as Grace Kelly, who appeared in four out of her total 11 features, or Tippi Hedren, an unknown actress until the seminal 1963 movie, The Birds, and then Marnie)
Probing Hitchcock’s films that are star-driven (roughly, from the 1940 Oscar winner Rebecca through The Birds and Marnie, in 1963 and 1964, respectively.
How he adopted and adapted to the decline of stardom as a system, relying more heavily on ensembles of character actors, in most of the films over the last decade of his career, 1969 (Topaz) to 1976 (Family Plot)
Ch. 6: Hitchcock and the Source of his Movies
Literary Perspective
Hitchcock has made 53 films, most of which based on or inspired by other literary sources, such as novels, short stories, plays.
Only a few of his pictures, albeit some of the most popular ones, such as the 1959 North By Northwest, were based on original screenplays.
Ch. 7: Hitchcock and his Audiences
Complicity, Voyeurism, Fetishism, Exhibitionism
Hitchcock’s philosophy of his audience: How he perceived, constructed, instructed, and manipulated his viewers by making specific demands on them through norms and expectations, which he would then satisfy, or violate, or utterly deny.
This chapter will probe the notions of Complicity, Voyeurism, Fetishism, and Exhibitionism
How Hitchcock functioned (and changed) as an artistic and commercial director in an ever-evolving industry that’s market-driven
Consumerism: Strategies of promoting and marketing his movies
Cameo appearances, introductions, impact of his Television series on film work
Ch. 8: Hitchcock and his Movie Genres
This chapter will contest and debunk the prevalent notion that Hitchcock was “the Master of Suspense,” an excessively simplistic perception that reduces the rich body of his work to the genre of the crime-suspense-thriller.
The impossibility of applying conventional and widely held generic labels to his films, especially the masterpieces (Shadow of a Doubt, Notorious, Rear Window, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds)
Hitchcock has created and contributed to almost every or any genre: war movies (even propaganda features during WWII), suspense-thriller, family melodramas, ironic romances, horror (The Birds)
Ch. 9: Hitchcock as Storyteller
Structuralism
Elements:
Narrative Structure, Evolution, Climaxes
Closures: Happy Endings; Resolutions; Ambiguities
Character Analysis: Heroes and Villains; Lead Vs. Character Roles
Intertextuality: Within and Without Hitchcock Work
Ch. 10: Hitchcock as Craftsman and Artist
Visual Style
Innovation/Experimentation
Mise-en-Scene Vs. Montage
Reliance on and Collaborations with Same Craftsmen: Cinematographers, Editors, Production Designers, Composers
Ch. 11: Hitchcock and Mythology
Semiotics
Signs; Symbols; Myths, Allegories
Tone and Mood: Humor, wit, irony, sarcasm
Ch. 12: Hitchcock and Auteurism
Hitchcock as Cinema’s Quintessential Auteur
Contribution of Auteurism (by Truffaut, Andrew Sarris, Peter Bogdanovich) to reevaluation and elevation of Hitchcock’s Oeuvre
Recurrent thematic and visual elements in his oeuvre
Ch. 14: Hitchcock and Feminism
Gender Roles
Male-Female Gaze
Ch. 15: Hitchcock and the Queer Gaze
Queer Theory
Gay and Lesbian Characters
Homophobia
Ch. 16: Hitchcock’s Legacy
Status of Hitchcock, Then and Now
Critical Standing
Conclusion
Appendices
Bibliography
