James Baquet

    From the year of my birth until I was nearly 10, something creepy happened in our living room almost every week. Though others called it “suspenseful,” I called it “scary.” I’m talking about “Alfred Hitchcock Presents,” an anthology show for TV created by the “master of suspense” himself, Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980).

    Little did I know that in later years I’d come to admire Hitchcock’s taut thrillers, like “North by Northwest” or “Vertigo.” Nor did I realize that some of his “scary” movies — like “The Birds” and “Psycho” — would turn out to be at least campy, if not downright funny.

    Hitchcock, like his older contemporary Charlie Chaplin, was an Englishman, though Hitchcock became an American citizen in 1955.

    He started out by writing short stories before becoming a menial in the budding British film industry, working on silent films in those days. His directorial debut was canceled due to financial problems, and his first completed features flopped. It wasn’t until 1927 — five years after he started — that he directed a commercially successful film — not surprisingly, establishing many of the techniques that made him famous.

    His style was so distinctive that an adjective was coined to describe it: Hitchcockian. Its elements often included a twist at the climax, an attractive heroine called a “Hitchcock blonde,” a man wrongly accused, a device used to move the plot forward, but which is never explained (called a “macguffin”), the use of famous landmarks and a suspenseful visual style (smoke, shadows, etc.).

    By the late 1930s, he was such a hit that a New York Times writer stated: “Three unique and valuable institutions the British have that we in America have not. Magna Carta, the Tower Bridge and Alfred Hitchcock, the greatest director of screen melodramas in the world.”

    In 1939, Hitchcock came to Hollywood.

    He was knighted by the Queen of England in 1980. Though his over 50 feature films received a total of 50 Academy Awards nominations and wins, oddly he never received an Oscar for best director. He was nominated five times.

    Vocabulary

    Which word above means:

    1. “so bad, it’s good,” awkwardly amusing

    2. failed

    3. collection of stories

    4. completely, absolutely

    5. tense, suspenseful

    6. made a “sir”

    7. low-skilled worker

    8. developing, beginning to grow

    9. famous sights, like the Statue of Liberty

    10. turning point towards which a story builds