Top 5 of Hitchcock

Yeah Shadow of a Doubt I think is Hitchcock's best looking film. I thought it was cause of the cinematographer, but perhaps the use of locations as oppose to studios did as well. Which I find strange cause a studio you can design to look however you want, compared to a real location, where you are forced to suffer with the non-cinematic looking shortcomings of the location.

But if Hitchock said that one of the reasons why he liked Shadow of a Doubt was cause no one complained that the movie had any implausibilities in the plot, perhaps this kind of makes the movie a lesser one though, because the plot is so logical and so realistic, that nothing crazier is allowed to happen, compared to his others.

1.Vertigo
2.Rebecca
3. North by Northwest
4.Strangers on a train.

I gotta see this Rebecca everyone keeps mentioning .

Do eeeet!

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My Favorite Films

I have only watched a few of Hitchcock's films, but I would like to see them all.
I've seen
Rear Window
Rebecca
Psycho
and
Stranger's on a train.
He is probably one of the best (if not the best) when it comes to mixing technique and plot.

To Catch A Thief
NOrth by Northwest
the Lady Vanishes
THe Thirty-Nine Steps
Foreign Correspondent

I haven't seen a lot of his films, but out of the ones I have:

1. Rope (adore it, not just because it's homoerotic either the dark humour, visual puns, brilliant acting by people who rarely appeared on film. It's experimental and unconvential style paid off massively for me)
2. Psycho
3. Strangers on a Train (I loved Farley Granger after seeing him in Senso with Alida Valli, but he's far from the only thing I like about this one)
4. Rear Window (Thelma Ritter steals everything I've seen her in )
5. The Birds (probably as the making of it was just as fascinating as the film itself. Tippi Hedren vs Hitchcock is a Feud season waiting to happen)

1. Vertigo
2. Rear Window.
3. Rope
4. Psycho
5. The man who knew too much

Also these are the only ones ive seen.

PSYCHO
VERTIGO
NORTH BY NORTHWEST
ROPE
REAR WINDOW

Dial M for Murder
Rope
Vertigo
Strangers on a Train
Rebecca

I'm surprised how many people are picking Rope, and I thought I would be the only one to put it in my top 5.

It'd be on mine, too.

Some of your pictures don't work.

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Thanks again, Mr Portridge.

The two images not working are The Lady Vanishes, and Dial M For Murder.

Well Rope is now off the top 5 I think now, cause I just saw Lifeboat, and have to put that one in my top 5 now, thereby bumping down Rope perhaps. Or perhaps Rear Window, but how do you choose between Rope and Rear Window, for your #5 spot?

5.North by Northwest
4.Rear Window
3.Vertigo
2.Les Diaboliques
1.The Wages of Fear

Heh, heh. You've thrown in a "ringer" here.. The director of these two, Henri-Georges Clouzot, was nicknamed "the French Alfred Hitchcock". And rightfully so, since he was also a master of suspense. It's too bad that he was plagued with so many health problems. It would have been wonderful to see additional pictures from him.

I've seen Diaboliques, which is a splendid film. But I'll have to look for The Wages of Fear, with English subtitles.

~Doc

1) Dial M for Murder
2) Vertigo
3) Psycho
4) North by Northwest
5) Rear Window

Special mention to Shadow of a Doubt. The first Hitchcock movie I watched.

I'm always a little surprised when Rope, or for that matter, Rebecca appear at the top of "best" Hitchcock films.

Hitchcock considered Rope as something of an experiment. He stated in his lengthy Truffaut interviews: "I undertook Rope as a stunt; that's the only way I can describe it. I really don't know how I came to indulge in it."

To be sure, the film was interesting (inspired by the Leopold and Loeb murder of 1924), and technically it was a major milestone in terms of exceedingly long takes, which he notably increased in his subsequent Under Capricorn. But to my taste the film felt awkwardly self conscious, almost spoof-like. James Stewart was miscast as the detective, and even a gifted actor such as he could not bring off the incongruity.

The picture held one's interest because of Hitchcock's clever suspenseful tack of putting the body in the trunk, around which the story developed, and that, by itself, was memorable. But the picture had too much the feel of a second rate stage drama.

Rebecca was a fine film, but just not good Hitchcock. David O. Selznick severely restricted Hitchcock's input, although Hitchcock was able to insert some of the best parts of the film while Selznick was busy with Gone With the Wind. For example Selznick had stupidly wanted to spell out in smoke the letter "R" over the burning mansion. But Hitch came back and replaced it with a burning monogrammed "R" negligee box laying on top of a pillow. He shot only the film that was necessary, which limited Selznick's ability to come back and edit.

Anyway the choice between Rope and Rear Window would be very easy for me. In my view, Rope was a curio, whereas Rear Window is a masterpiece.

~Doc

Yep I can see that. Rope does have some plot limitations in the second act perhaps. I just get sucked into it, cause I love the villain in te movie, and he might be Hitchcock's best villain. I also love the set they shot on, and it's probably the best of his one setting sets. But maybe I let that drive too much of it for me, when the second act might not have as much going on.