For years, Alfred Hitchcock was written off as “the master of suspense,” and now the late Sir Alfred has been similarly eulogized. The epithet is rich with slighting implications. It suggests, first of all, that Hitchcock was stuck in a rut, playing with kid stuff: he made “thrillers” (as John Ford made “Westerns”), while Welles and Bergman created films. “Master of suspense” also connotes the technician’s narrow expertise. Knowing all the tricks of the trade, that “master” could work his audience adroitly. Such a talent seems manipulative as well as limited; a “master of suspense” is, literally, a puppeteer.



Of course the epithet has always been used with affection by those well-meaning triflers who call themselves “film buffs.” These people like to memorize “great touches,” “classic scenes,” the clips that fill out TV specials: Cary Grant on his way upstairs with the Fatal Glass of Milk, Cary Grant running away from the crop-dusting plane, Gary Grant on his way downstairs with Ingrid Bergman, Janet Leigh taking her shower. By celebrating only a few thrills, these enthusiasts perpetuate the notion that Hitchcock was simply a gifted sensationalist, which is just what his detractors like to claim: “a dealer in shock, as another might go in for dry goods” (Dwight MacDonald), “a pop cynic, cinematically ingenious” (Stanley Kauffmann), “a masterly builder of mousetraps,” whose techniques “have more to do with gamesmanship than with art” (Pauline Kael), etc. He has been both dismissed and idolized for the same wrong reason. His fans and his critics implicitly agree that Alfred Hitchcock will loom large in the annals of mass titillation, along with PT Barnum, Josef Goebbels, and the roller coaster.

Hitchcock himself inadvertently helped to foster this impression. Although voluble in interviews, he shied away from exegesis. He would hastily explain things in the simplest terms, or frustrate questions of interpretation with genial acquiescence. Asked if a certain scene might have this or that significance, Hitchcock would agree that it was possible, and the subject would be closed: “Isn’t it a fascinating design? One could study it forever.” Rather than play the critic, he would tell anecdotes, formulate rules on narrative strategy, and boast about his technical inventions: “By the way, did you like the scene with the glass of milk?” he asked Truffaut: “I put a light right inside the glass because I wanted it to be luminous.” He would pretend not to have thought about the most important things, dwelling instead on how he got the glass to glow, the merry-go-round to run wild, the plane to crash at sea.

To refer to Alfred Hitchcock as the “master of suspense” makes as much sense as calling James Joyce an “ace punster.”

This apparent fascination with mechanics sometimes was taken as proof that Hitchcock was only after neat effects and crude responses. In fact, the opposite is true. He considered those effects amusing, but not all that important since he seemed downright eager to spoil their impact by carefully explaining them. (Even while The Birds was still in production, he was already telling interviewers how he managed the illusion of a bird attack.) Moreover, by talking mostly about the nuts and bolts of spectacle, Hitchcock could avoid making authorial pronouncements that might have limited the meanings of his films. He would not struggle to describe what he wanted his viewers to see for themselves.

This was his implicit purpose, and the secret of his inexhaustible cinema: he wanted his viewers to learn for themselves how to see for themselves. He would have us discover our vision, and then distrust it. “You expect quite a lot of your audience,” suggested one interviewer. “For those who want it,” he replied: “I don’t think films should be looked at once.” “For those who want it”: although Hitchcock was adept at providing his one-shot viewers with a good 90-minute jolt, he was uneasy about so mechanical an exercise, and worked, ever more subtly, to draw the viewer toward an awareness of visual nuance that would surpass the immediate pleasures of the one-night stand. And he could do this because he had mastered every aspect of his art.