Film Techniques of Alfred Hitchcock

"Hitch" is one of the most famous directors of all time. Most people have probably seen one of his films at some time. He was "Sir Alfred" for a brief four months before his death in 1980. He also produced and hosted the television anthology series Alfred Hitchcock Presents from 1955 to 1965, although he only actually directed a handful of the show's episodes. Many of his films are adaptations of novels or short stories.
Independent film director Jeffrey Michael Bays, a life-long fan of Alfred Hitchcock, has compiled this article to further spread the brilliant simplicity of Hitchcock's creative genius.

How to Turn Your Boring Movie Into a Hitchcock Thriller
Filmmakers and critics alike have rejoiced at this simplified encyclopedia of film director Alfred Hitchcock's techniques. From his notorious sequences seen from the character's viewpoint, to the collage of the Psycho shower scene, and the linear simplicity of his plots, this list of his top 13 techniques is compiled directly from his interviews.


Humor: Hitchcock's Secret Weapon
With a balance of laughs and tension, Hitchcock was able to strike the perfect chord of suspense in his feature films. This article shines light on an often ignored aspect of his style: his directorial wit. It is his quirky characters, ironic situations, whimsical settings, and deliberate gags that raise his films to an unmatched Hitchcockian brilliance.


Message in a Booth: Arbogast's Last Words
One scene in the 1960 thriller Psycho creates a forward momentum of suspense throughout the final Act. Here we explore the phone call Arbogast makes from a phone both in his final hours. The Telephone Booth Scene is a simple one of construction lasting less than two minutes of screen time and comprised of only two shots, but it becomes so much more.

Creating a Hitchcockian Opening
Hitchcock could ignite our curiosity at the outset of each film in ways unlooked at until now. Here we explore the most striking moments from each opening sequence of his theatrical films and examine his strategies for pulling in the viewer. Trends emerge from his use of comical music score to his movement of camera through public space, and landscapes filled with caricatures.


The Definitive List of Hitchcock MacGuffins
We are on a quest to compile the most definitive list of the MacGuffins used in Alfred Hitchcock's feature films and TV episodes. What's a MacGuffin? Find out what Hitchcock thought of this elusive plot device. From the weapons plans of Mr. Memory, to the goverment secrets being stolen by Van Damme, we've listed them all here.


Sound: Hitchcock's Third Dimension
With the production of his first sound film, Blackmail (1929), Hitchcock found new ways to manipulate the soundtrack in order to add new dimensions to the flat movie screen. Here we look at his instictive techniques of sound mixing in Blackmail as it laid the foundation for his use of sound in later works - from kept secrets to silent murders.


Jeffrey Michael Bays is producer of the award-winning radio special Not From Space (2003) heard on XM Satellite Radio. He recently directed an homage to Alfred Hitchcock's techniques entitled Offing David (2008), an Australian film starring Nathaniel Buzolic and Asha Kuerten. A graduate of Webster University, St. Louis, he just completed a Master of Arts in Cinema at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. His current research is in the art of scene transitions.

Brazilian Stunner Camila Alves Engaged to Matthew McConaughey

Labels: WRLTHD Entertainment news

Written By Alexandra Gratereaux
Matthew McConaughey is officially off the market, ladies!

The “Lincoln Lawyer” actor popped the question on Sunday to Brazilian model/ TV host Camila Alves.

He then took to Twitter to tell his fans about his new fiancée.

“Just asked Camila to marry me, #MerryChristmas," McConaughey posted on his Twitter account, followed by a link that led to a photo of the two kissing.

McConaughey, 42, shares two children with Alves, Levi, 3 and Vida, who turns two in a few weeks. The actor and Alves have been an item since 2006, The New York Daily News reports.

The stunning Alves is the host of Bravo’s reality show “Shear Genius,”, which pits hairdressers against each other.

McConaughey told GQ Magazine a few months ago that Alves is the woman he wants to “make a family with” and live his “life out together”.

    Just asked Camila to marry me, #MerryChristmas.

- Matthew McConaughey, on Twitter

"I always wanted to be a father," McConaughey told People Magazine in 2008. "It just took the right woman and the right time to make it happen."

Alves certainly made an impression when she and McConaughey first began dating.

People reports that the two lovebirds were inseparable from day one, with Alves being seen at McConaughey’s side as he filmed “Fools Gold” in Australia and “Surfer Dude” in the Bahamas.

A source close to McConaughey told the magazine that Alves and the actor share a love for the outdoors.

"She likes roughing it," the source said. "She doesn't complain when they go hiking for 10 days without clean clothes or a shower."

This War Horse is Not Just a War Horse

By Rex Reed
Irvine.

Steven Spielberg at the top of his powers as one of the most successful and creative film directors of the past century is the best reason I can think of to get off your duff and head for the cinema on Christmas Day. You will not believe the epic splendor, sweeping drama and heart-stopping passion he brings to War Horse. It’s a rare and genuine movie masterpiece that deserves the label in a thousand ways.

Turning a beloved play into a movie is a job for either a fool or a daredevil. Mr. Spielberg is neither, but he is a visionary with unflinching faith in his own instincts. He must have known going in that he couldn’t satisfy the myriad fans of the London and Broadway hit about the cruel things the British did to their horses in World War I. On the stage, the familiar theme of a boy’s unshakable love for his horse was innovative in its use of life-size puppets with real feelings and expressions that moved like Tinker Toys. The film uses actual horses to tell the story of a colt named Joey, sold to the cavalry to lug the cannons of war through the German trenches, and a farmboy named Albert Narracott, who enlisted to travel halfway across Europe to rescue him from the front lines. On screen, Albert is played by impossibly handsome newcomer Jeremy Irvine, whose career is already reaching rocket force (he follows War Horse as Pip in the new production of Dickens’s Great Expectations). Instead of puppets, Joey is played by 15 different horses, but the one featured most prominently is American equine Finder, who starred in Seabiscuit. Finder is a four-legged superstar who can do everything but talk, even though he has a way of communicating with Albert that is awesome. What he goes through in War Horse is so rending that never before has the disclaimer “No animals were harmed in the filming of this motion picture” carried so much badly needed reassurance. Finder deserves an Oscar for—well, for being the best and most beautiful horse on the screen.

Based on the 1982 children’s novel by Michael Morpurgo, War Horse is an elegiac film that clocks in at two hours and 20 minutes, but I treasured every single second. Mr. Spielberg brings so much decency and integrity to the familiar theme of a boy in love with a horse that I didn’t miss the puppets at all. The humor and spirit that had such a profound impact on audiences young and old are not only preserved, but enhanced by the personalities of real animals. The careful result is a personalized experience that inspires the same kind of love audiences used to have for Lassie.

The vast and sprawling screenplay by Lee Hall and Richard Curtis respects the story enough to leave it unchanged, without embellishment. A hardscrabble sharecropper named Ted Narracott goes to auction to buy a plow horse, but instead he arrogantly outbids his greedy, mean-spirited landlord (David Thewlis) for a magnificent animal of no real value to a crop planter, bringing down the wrath of his pragmatic, long-suffering wife, Rose (Emily Watson). Their besotted son, Albie, names the horse Joey and vows to teach him how to pull his weight and till the soil. Joey is stubborn and willful with a mind of his own, and when the crops fail, the only way to pay the rent is to sell Joey to the military. The next hour is told from the horse’s point of view as the camera follows him through the French battlefields in 1914, where he is cared for by a kind British officer, to enemy lines, where he bonds with a headstrong black stallion, a German deserter and a Dutch girl who protects him by hiding him in a windmill. Captured by the enemy, Joey finally ends up in the Somme where Albie sees combat at last. In one particularly sensational sequence, Joey is trapped in barbed wife and rescued by two soldiers, one German and one British, who momentarily put aside their differences through a mutual compassion for an injured animal, use wire cutters to save the horse’s life, and take a minute to share memories of their homes on opposite sides of the conflict. If you are not moved to tears by that scene, or by Albie’s eventual reunion with his horse, then you need to see a doctor.

The logistics are overwhelming. According to the Imperial War Museum, more than four million horses perished in the so-called Great War, and Mr. Spielberg puts you right into the middle of their pain and terror in sequences using as many as 5,800 extras and 280 horses without computer-generated images. What an accomplishment. Like the play, the emotional high point of the film is when Albie finally finds Joey. By this time, you’re so weary from the gas masks, the grenades, the rats and the cannon fire that you can hardly summon the strength for tears, but when Albie, blinded by mortar, and Joey, lame and half-dead, reach the green pastures and rose gardens of Devon, the tears are evident without coaxing.  Will Rogers always said, “Horses are smarter than humans. You never heard of a horse going broke betting on people.” True, but when Albie and Joey reunite, two wounded soldiers of war going home together, you feel the values horses and humans can share through love, loyalty, persistence and understanding. It left me emotionally wrecked.

War Horse is a don’t-miss Spielberg classic that reaches true perfection. It’s as good as movies can get, and one of the greatest triumphs of this or any other year. For maximum enjoyment, I recommend both a box of tissues and a box of popcorn.

rreed@observer.com

WAR HORSE

Running Time 146 minutes

Written by Lee Hall and Richard Curtis

Directed by Steven Spielberg

Starring Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson and David Thewlis

Film director Yoshimitsu Morita at 61

TOKYO - Director Yoshimitsu Morita, whose films depicted the absurdity and vulnerability of everyday life in conformist Japan, has died. He was 61.

Morita, who won international acclaim over his prolific 30-year career, died Tuesday of acute liver failure at a Tokyo hospital, said Yoko Ota, spokeswoman at Toei Co., the film company behind his latest work.

Morita's movies were distinctly Japanese, depicting the fragile beauty of the nation's human psyche and visual landscape while daringly poking fun at its ridiculous tendency for rigid bureaucracy and ritualistic hierarchy.

Morita made a splash among global film buffs with 1983's "Family Game," starring Yusaku Matsuda of "Black Rain" as an offbeat tutor who forms a heartwarming relationship with a young man in a stereotypical middle-class family.

Its striking cinematography, focusing on rows and rows of identical apartments and people dining solemnly sitting side by side, was an exhilarating parody of Japanese family values.

His works were shown at many international film festivals, including Berlin and Montreal. They included "Tsubaki Sanjuro," a 2007 remake of the 1962 classic by Akira Kurosawa.

'Kojak' Actor Dan Frazer Dies

An AMPAS member, Frazer's credits included "Deconstructing Harry," "Gideon's Trumpet" and "Barney Miller."

NEW YORK -- Veteran film and television actor Dan Frazer, best known for his role as Captain Frank McNeil on the 1970s television series Kojak, has died in New York. He was 90.

Frazer's daughter, Susanna Frazer, said Sunday her father died of cardiac arrest Dec. 16 at his home in Manhattan. She described him as a "very truthful, naturalistic actor."

Frazer started playing character roles in various television series and films in the 1950s. His films include Cleopatra Jones, Take the Money and Run, Gideon's Trumpet and Deconstructing Harry.

Besides Kojak, Frazer's television appearances include Car 54, Where Are You, Route 66, Barney Miller and Law & Order.

He was a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and an adviser to the Workshop Theatre Co.

Robert Gilby appointed managing director for Walt Disney Company, Southeast Asia

SINGAPORE: The Walt Disney Company yesterday announced the appointment of Robert Gilby as managing director, The Walt Disney Company Southeast Asia.

He would report to Andy Bird, chairman Walt Disney International.

In this newly created role, Gilby would be responsible for driving the company’s strategy, coordinating and leading all Disney business divisions, overseeing Disney global franchises, expanding existing businesses and seeking out new business opportunities across the region with a focus on Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.

“Expanding our brand internationally is the cornerstone of the company’s growth strategy,” said Bird when commenting on the appointment in a statement released here yesterday.

Gilby would continue in his current role of managing director, Disney Media Distribution Asia Pacific, reporting to Ben Pyne, president, Global Distribution, Disney Media Networks.

In response to his appointment, Gilby pointed to the economic and market fundamentals of the South East Asian media and entertainment sector, as representing an enormously attractive opportunity for Disney.

He said it was incredibly exciting to be given the opportunity to work in one of the most amazing emerging markets in the world.

Gilby joined Disney in January 2006, as managing director of Disney Channels in the UK, Scandinavia & Emerging Markets. — Bernama

How Tom Cruise and Sean Penn Got Their Big Breaks

by Bill Higgins

The Hollywood Reporter's review of Taps in 1981 showed prescient understatement when it said the supporting cast demonstrated a "potential for future assignments." That would include the unknown pair of Tom Cruise, then 19, and Sean Penn, 21.

The film, which grossed $35.9 million domestically and marks the 30th anniversary of its release Dec. 18, was about military academy students who initiate an armed occupation to save their school from real estate developers. The lead cadet role had gone to Timothy Hutton, 21, who'd won a supporting actor Oscar for Ordinary People just months earlier.

Producer Stanley Jaffe says Cruise originally had been set to play a background character but was shifted to a key role when he impressed director Harold Becker during the four weeks of rehearsal that resembled a boot camp.

"He was out-marching the other cadets on the parade field," said Becker in 2004.

Penn was chosen after being spotted starring as the timid son of an abusive father in the small Broadway play Heartland.

The trio formed an incredibly potent cast. "It's that thing some people have," says Jaffe. "If you knew how to describe it, you'd bottle it."

Cruise's next role was in Francis Ford Coppola's The Outsiders, Hutton's was in Sidney Lumet's Daniel, and Penn got a major career boost when he played Jeff Spicoli in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Although the Amy Heckerling comedy brought Penn much more attention, he told biographer Richard T. Kelly he looks back fondly on working with Cruise and Hutton because it "was like I'd gone to high school, and now Taps was college for me. And it was Fraternity Row."

"Cruise was so … like he was training for the f--in' Olympics. I think he was the first person I ever said, 'Calm down!' to. A fun guy, too." -- Penn