Change everything in your screenplay so that it is done for the audience. Nothing is more important than how each scene is going to affect the viewer. Make sure the content engages them and reels them in. Use the characters to tease the viewer and pull them along desperately wanting more.Hitchcock knew why people are drawn to a darkened theater to absorb themselves for hours with images on a screen. They do it to have fun. In the same way people go to a roller coaster to get thrown around at high speeds, theater audiences know they are safe. As a film director you can throw things at them, hurl them off a cliff, or pull them into a dangerous love story, and they know that nothing will happen to them. They're confident that they'll be able to walk out the exit when its done and resume their normal lives. And, the more fun they have, the quicker they will come back begging for more. (Gottlieb)
STEP 2: Frame for Emotion
Emotion (in the form of fear, laughter, surprise, sadness, anger, boredom, etc.) is the ultimate goal of each scene. The first consideration of where to place the camera should involve knowing what emotion you want the audience to experience at that particular time. Emotion comes directly from the actor's eyes. You can control the intensity of that emotion by placing the camera close or far away from those eyes. A close-up will fill the screen with emotion, and pulling away to a wide angle shot will dissipate that emotion. A sudden cut from wide to close-up will give the audience a sudden surprise. Sometimes a strange angle above an actor will heighten the dramatic meaning. (Truffaut)Hitchcock used this theory of proximity to plan out each scene. These varations are a way of controlling when the audience feels intensity, or relaxation. Hitchcock compared this to a composer writing a music score - except instead of playing instruments, he's playing the audience!
STEP 3: Camera is Not a Camera
The camera should take on human qualities and roam around playfully looking for something suspicious in a room. This allows the audience to feel like they are involved in uncovering the story. Scenes can often begin by panning a room showing close-ups of objects that explain plot elements.This goes back to Hitchcock's beginnings in silent film. Without sound, filmmakers had to create ways to tell the story visually in a succession of images and ideas. Hitchcock said this trend changed drastically when sound finally came to film in the 1930's. Suddenly everything went toward dialogue oriented material based on scripts from the stage. Movies began to rely on actors talking, and visual storytelling was almost forgotten. (Truffaut) Always use the camera as more than just a camera.
STEP 4: Dialogue Means Nothing
One of your characters must be pre-occupied with something during a dialogue scene. Their eyes can then be distracted while the other person doesn't notice. This is a good way to pull the audience into a character's secretive world.
“People don’t always express their inner thoughts to one another," said Hitchcock, "a conversation may be quite trivial, but often the eyes will reveal what a person thinks or needs.” The focus of the scene should never be on what the characters are actually saying. Have something else going on. Resort to dialogue only when it’s impossible to do otherwise.
"In other words we don’t have pages to fill, or pages from a typewriter to fill, we have a rectangular screen in a movie house,” said Hitchcock. (Schickel)
STEP 5: Point of View Editing
Jimmy Stewart looks at dog and then we see him smiling. Jimmy Stewart looks at a woman undressing and then we see him smiling. Those two smiles have completely different meanings, even if they are the exact same smile.
Putting an idea into the mind of the character without explaining it in dialogue is done by using a point-of-view shot sequence. This is subjective cinema. You take the eyes of the characters and add something for them to look at.- Start with a close-up of the actor
- Cut to a shot of what they're seeing
- Cut back to the actor to see his reaction
- Repeat as desired
You can edit back and forth between the character and the subject as many times as you want to build tension. The audience won't get bored. This is the most powerful form of cinema, even more important than acting. To take it even further have the actor walk toward the subject. Switch to a tracking shot to show his changing perspective as he walks. The audience will believe they are sharing something personal with the character. This is what Hitchcock calls "pure cinema." (Truffaut)
Note: If another person looks at the character in point-of-view they must look directly at the camera.
STEP 6: Montage Gives You Control
Divide action into a series of close-ups shown in succession. Don't avoid this basic technique. This is not the same as throwing together random shots into a fight sequence to create confusion. Instead, carefully chose a close-up of a hand, an arm, a face, a gun falling to the floor - tie them all together to tell a story. In this way you can portray an event by showing various pieces of it and having control over the timing. You can also hide parts of the event so that the mind of the audience is engaged. (Truffaut)
Hitchcock said this was "transferring the menace from the screen into the mind of the audience." (Schickel) The famous shower scene in Psycho uses montage to hide the violence. You never see the knife hitting Janet Leigh. The impression of violence is done with quick editing, and the killing takes place inside the viewer's head rather than the screen. Also important is knowing when not to cut. (Truffaut)
Basic rule: anytime something important happens, show it in a close-up. Make sure the audience can see it.
STEP 7: Keep the Story Simple!
If your story is confusing or requires a lot of memorization, you're never going to get suspense out of it. The key to creating that raw Hitchcock energy is by using simplistic, linear stories that the audience can easily follow. Everything in your screenplay must be streamlined to offer maximum dramatic impact. Remove all extraneous material and keep it crisp. Each scene should include only those essential ingredients that make things gripping for the audience. As Hitchcock says, “what is drama, after all, but life with the dull bits cut out…” (Truffaut)An abstract story will bore the audience. This is why Hitchcock tended to use crime stories with spies, assassinations, and people running from the police. These sort of plots make it easy to play on fear, but are not mandatory for all movies.
STEP 8: Characters Must Break Cliché
Make all of your characters the exact opposite of what the audience expects in a movie. Turn dumb blondes into smart blondes, give the Cuban guy a French accent, and the criminals must be rich and successful. They should have unexpected personalities, making decisions on a whim rather than what previous buildup would suggest. These sort of ironic characters make them more realistic to the audience, and much more ripe for something to happen to them.
Hitchcock criminals tend to be wealthy upper class citizens whom you’d never suspect, the policeman and politicians are usually the bumbling fools, the innocent are accused, and the villains get away with everything because nobody suspects them. They surprise you at every step of the plot.
STEP 9: Use Humor to Add Tension
Humor is essential to Hitchcock storytelling. Pretend you are playing a practical joke on the main character of your movie. Give him the most ironic situations to deal with. It's the unexpected gag, the coincidence, the worst possible thing that can go wrong - all can be used to build tension.In Marnie, Tippi Hedren is stealing money from an office safe and is just about to leave when she notices the maid happens to be cleaning in the next room. The maid is completely innocent and unaware. Hedren will get caught if the maid sees her, but the audience is already hoping that she gets away with it. The more happily the maid mops the floor and the closer she gets to seeing Hedren, the higher the tension.
You'll also find that Hitchcock tended to use comical old women to add a flavor of innocent humor in his films. They will usually be opinionated, chatty, and have a highly optimistic view about crime. If someone were committing a crime they might even help with it!
[MORE about use of humor]
STEP 10: Two Things Happening at Once
When unexpected guests arrive at the hotel room in the Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Jimmy Stewart and Doris Day are in the midst of a tense phone-call. The arrival of the guests laughing and joking serve a dramatic counterpoint to the real momentum of the scene. In Spellbound (1945) Ingrid Bergman sees a note which has been slipped under her door. Just when she grabs for it, her colleagues walk in and speak with her about the disapearance of Gregory Peck, completely unaware they are standing on top of the note from him! The end result is - the audience pays more attention to what's happening.
STEP 11: Suspense is Information
"Information" is essential to Hitchcock suspense; showing the audience what the characters don’t see. If something is about to harm the characters, show it at beginning of the scene and let the scene play out as normal. Constant reminders of this looming danger will build suspense. But remember - the suspense is not in the mind of the character. They must be completely unaware of it. (Schickel, Truffaut)In Family Plot (1976) Hitchcock shows the audience that brake fluid is leaking out of a car well before the characters find out about it. In Psycho (1960) we know about the crazy mother before the detective (Martin Balsam) does, making the scene in which Balsam enters the house one of the most suspenseful scenes in Hitchcock's career.
“The essential fact is to get real suspense you must let the audience have information." --Alfred Hitchcock
STEP 12: Surprise and Twist
Once you've built your audience into gripping suspense it must never end the way they expect. The bomb must never go off! Lead them in one direction and then pull the rug out from under them in a surprise twist.
In the climax scene of Saboteur (1942) Norman Lloyd is cornered on the top of the Statue of Liberty as Robert Cummings holds him at gunpoint. Just when you think it's over, Cummings begins to speak, startling Lloyd to fall backwards over the edge!
STEP 13: Warning: May Cause MacGuffin
The MacGuffin is the side effect of creating pure suspense. When scenes are built around dramatic tension, it doesn’t really matter what the story is about. If you've done your job and followed all the previous steps, the audience is still glued no matter what. You can use random plot devices known as the MacGuffin.The MacGuffin is nothing. The only reason for the MacGuffin is to serve a pivotal reason for the suspense to occur. (Schickel) It could be something as vague as the "government secrets perhaps" in North by Northwest, or the long detailed weapons plans of Mr. Memory in the 39 Steps. Or, it could be something simple like the dog blocking the stairway in Strangers on a Train. Nobody cares about the dog. It's only there for one reason - suspense. It could have just as easily been a person, an alarm, a talking parrot, or a macguffin!
Continue to Part 2: How Hitchcock used humor...
This list is by no means comprehensive. We invite your comments and additions. Our goal is to be an Internet source easily found to help those in need of quick introduction. You can also find more by reading the books listed below. They include much more detail on these theories and provide a lot more examples. These books are essential reading for any filmmaker or Hitchcock fan.
Written by Jeff Bays, June 2004 Updated: July 2004, January 2006, December 2007. Jeff Bays is a graduate of the Webster University School of Communications, and is an award-winning radio producer and independent filmmaker.
Contact: info@borgus.com
Book Sources:
Truffaut, Francois. "Hitchcock" Revised Edition. New York. 1985.
Gottlieb, Sydney. "Hitchcock on Hitchcock: Selected Writings and Interviews" Los Angeles. 1997.
Spoto, Donald. "The Art of Alfred Hitchcock: Fifty Years of his Motion Pictures" New York. 1992.
Video Source:
AMERICAN CINEMATHEQUE DOCUMENTARY "ALFRED HITCHOCK: MASTER OF SUSPENSE" City Center of Music and Drama by Richard Schickel, Fox Lorber Associates, Inc. 1973
Screen shots:
Family Plot, Torn Curtain, Rebecca, Psycho, Rear Window, Man Who Knew Too Much
All images are copyright each respective studio, and are most likely copyrighted under the Hitchcock Foundation.
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