My Top 5 Hitchcock Films
Alfred Hitchcock is the master. Not the master of suspense or any other subcategory of mastery, but just the master. I will not support this point with evidence or reason. I will merely state it as a fact, because it is. If you disagree, then begone. Or lay it on me in the comments… I love a good fight. Hitch has a looong filmography and, rationally, so of those films are more masterful than others. To satisfy the grubby little list-making part of my dark heart, I present to you…
What are your top 5 Hitchcock films? Leave your list in the comments!
My Top 5 Hitchcock Films
The 39 Steps (1935) or Saboteur (1942)
Ha! I just started my list and I’m cheating already! But the thing is The 39 Steps and Saboteur are both excellent and amazing movies and they are also the same movie. No, it’s true. While I have seen both of these movies, multiple times, I very recently watched them very close together. I didn’t realize until now that they are essentially the same exact movie. This is a known Hitch quantity (there’s a scene in these two which is also recycled in North by Northwest - third time’s a charm?). I mean, this is the director, who overtly remade the same movie twice, which leads me to…
The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) and The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
I did it again! I’ve managed to squeeze 4 movies into 2 slots on my top 5 list! I’m almost as subversive as the man himself. The Man Who Knew Too Much has always intrigued me, but really Hitch’s remaking of his own film isn’t that surprising. The Man Who Knew Too Much is quintessential Hitchcock, a man who is mistaken for another man and seems to know too much without nothing anything is the nut of the matter as it goes to Hitchcock movies. The fact that the master would later remake the movie with a bigger budget, better actors, and more sophisticated marketing makes sense. But I’m still fielding theories on why the little girl morphs into a boy.
The Lady Vanishes (1938)
Hitchcock could be terrifying, quite subversive, sometimes sadistic. But there is a riotous sort of humor (or as riotous as any Brit can be) that underlies much of his work. The Lady Vanishes brings together a lot of tropes common to Hitchcock films, notably trains and black humor. I just love it and you will too.
Spellbound (1945)
I tend to read Spellbound as a take down of the field of psychiatry, much like I read the pat psychiatric summation at the end of Psycho. Not everyone agrees with this opinion and I feel sorry for those wrong-headed people. But while Hitchcock was himself a insightful student of human psychology, he seemed to view psychiatry as a field of quacks. At any rate, this movie has a dream sequence designed by Salvador Dali and the most erotic delivery of the word “liverwurst” ever to be captured on film.
Vertigo (1958)
Duh.
What are your top 5 Hitchcock films? Leave your list in the comments!
About Brandy Dean
Social media consultant, blogger for hire, and lover of classic movies and silent films.
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1-Rope…I know but I can’t get enough of this movie. I own it and still watch it every time it’s on. The in jokes and sick sense of macabre get to me.
2-The Lady Vanishes…I love the acting, the look, the dialogue, and Michael Redgrave.
3-The 39 Steps…It’s funny. I just realized this was the same as Saboteur when I saw it a few weeks ago. This version is better even without Otto Kruger. Robert Donat trumps Robert Cummings every time.
4-Psycho…The conversation between Tony Perkins and Martin Balsam makes life worth living and Bernard Herrmann’s score is sublime.
5-Suspicion…That milk! The capon dissection scene fills me with joy.
I’ve had that Saboteur/The 39 Steps convo a hundred times in the past month. It seems to have flown under the radar for most people that IT’S THE EXACT SAME MOVIE! I had seen them both multiple times but it was only when I watched them within a few days of each other that it dawned on me.
I would put my top 5 as (in no particular order), Dial M for Murder for its pure perfection, Shadow of a Doubt for its thrilling terror, Psycho for its genius, Rope for its direction, and Lifeboat for its ingenuity.
I can’t believe North By Northwest isn’t being mentioned. Or Rear Window. Or Foreign Correspondent. But mostly North By Northwest. Not just my favorite Hitchcock–one of my favorite films ever.
Believe it! No, actually North by Northwest, Rear Window, Foreign Correspondent – pretty much every Hitch film except Juno and the Paycock could be on my top Hitchcock list. Sometimes you just have to make tough choices.
Here’s part of the logic. I think of NxNW, RW, and Vertigo as a sort of trinity of absolutely perfect films, so I only allowed myself to choose one. Vertigo is my fav, so it makes the list.
But you’ve got 3 here… if you could only pick 5, what would the 5 be?
North By Northwest
Rear Window
Foreign Correspondent
The 39 Steps
Psycho
Vertigo, Psycho, I. Confess and Rope.
North By Northwest, Rear Window and Strangers on a Train are tied for sixth.
Honorable mentions for The Trouble With Harry, Rebecca, Shadow of Doubt and Dial M for Murder.
Sorry. There are just so many. I love the majority of his work. I have to say that I believe Psycho was his last great film, though. The rest were blah.