Lecture Notes - Hitchcock and the Auteur

Alfred Hitchcock is one of the of the most well known and critically acclaimed film auteurs. Films include The Birds, Vertigo, Rebecca and Spellbound.  

Auteurs typically create films that are imprinted with a signature sense of style, and the viewer is led to these by key signifiers in their films. 

Signifiers of an Alfred Hitchcock film are 

• Suspense and Tension - his films are created in such a way that they manipulate the viewers sense of security, evoking an emotional response in his audience
• Little dialogue is used - instead, Hitchcock focuses on the visual to create tension and narrate the story
• Cameo appearances of him as a minor part
• Expressionism
• Obsessive casting of blondes as the main female role
• Continuous use of particular actors (Cary Grant, Doris Day, James Stewart)
• Dolly Zoom
• Cutting and Montage
• Themes of psychology and sexual epiphany

Many of his films display his obsession with psychoanalysis, in particular Vertigo, which explores Hitchcock's own fear of heights.
Symbolism is also used often in his films, such as the use of green in Vertigo, which appears in various forms in each scene, and represents the ever living. Spellbound is also another notable example, a film he collaborated on with Salvador Dali. In Spellbound he explores the use of eyes, intended to symbolise perception or voyeurism. The dream sequence in Spellbound again explores his fascination with psychology as he looks into a surreal internal dreamscape.

Other notable auteurs include Howard Hawks, Jean Renoir and Terrence Malick. 

Whilst many champion the concept of the auteur, there are some who critique the theory. 

There are many others working as hard as the 'visionary' to create the film, yet they get very little credit or acknowledgement within the industry or the press, it creates an elitism within the film industry, and it is also used as a capitalist device, by selling the film based not on the quality, but simply on a name.

Many auteurs are also incredibly self indulgent, relying more on style than any real content or relevant narrative, or simply creating a film meeting their own needs, and not those of the viewer.