Every day brings a new story. And each day contributes to story telling -- in prose and in poetry, in art and in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books.
Today is the story of Aug. 13th
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It is the 225th day of the year, leaving 140 days remaining in 2022.
He told his stories visually, on the movie screen, from the days of silent films in England, to the Golden Age of Hollywood in the 1940s, to the peak of his career in the 1950s and into the '60s. He was the master of suspense, relying on tried and true visual techniques he developed -- using the movie camera to heighten tension and filming scenes to give the audience a sense of voyeurism.
He plotted out the visualization of every scene. He know how to hold his audience by making it viscerally feel the terror the characters are going through -- through the use of mistaken identity, charming villains, and distrustful authority figures.
His films showed a bleak view of humanity and a sometimes macabre sense of humor.
After studying at the University of London, Hitchcock got his start in the movie industry designing title cards -- used in the silent era to introduce a film or explain the action. He quickly moved into directing, variously receiving or sharing credit in his early days.
The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, released in 1927, is considered the first "real" Hitchcock film, with the use of many of the conceptions he used that soon came to signify his style. It told the story of a man accused of being Jack the Ripper, and forced to try to prove his innocence. Two years later, he released his first talking film, Blackmail, which became that year's big hit in England.
Five years later, in 1934, he had his first international hit, The Man Who Knew Too Much.
In 1939, he was persuaded to move to Hollywood, where he directed Rebecca, which won the Best Picture Oscar in 1940 and gained Hitchcock his first nomination for best director. (Despite a total of five nominations, he never won.)
A string of successes followed: Lifeboat, set entirely in a lifeboat during the war years; Dial M for Murder; Rear Window, Vertigo, considered by many critics and film historians to be his best work; North by Northwest; Psycho, perhaps his best known work; and The Birds.
From 1955 to 1965, he hosted a popular television series, Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
Hitchcock died in 1980 in Los Angeles.
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