Hitchcock's Influences

Sorry I missed last week, but I was in Boston. I'm way behind in my work, so I'm leaving you all with another class essay this week....


The Master of Suspense! As the bearer of this title, Alfred Hitchcock has had an enormous influence on the work of filmmakers today, as well as on many of his contemporaries. But what styles of filmmaking influenced the master himself? Through his involvement with the London Film Society, Hitchcock was introduced to a multitude of filmmaking styles that greatly shaped his work, particularly during the formative years when his first true masterpieces emerged – the British Sound Period.
The influences of German Expressionism, Soviet Constructivism, and Griersonian Documentary manifest themselves in an exceedingly obvious manner in Hitchcock’s dark psychological dramas Blackmail (1929) and Sabotage (1936). The use of subjective point-of-view shots to explore a character’s psyche; montage and juxtaposition of shots; plastic material; and the attention paid to class and economic issues in his lighter comedic masterpieces – The 39 Steps (1935) and The Lady Vanishes (1938) – exhibit the massive influence those three schools of filmmaking exerted on all of Hitchcock’s work.
In The Lady Vanishes, Hitchcock makes extensive use of German Expressionist tendencies by using costume to reveal a character’s mental state. Gradually altering her costume, Hitchcock conveys Iris’ (Margaret Lockwood) transformation from a repressed, love-starved woman to an outspoken woman in love. When she first boards the train, she is wearing a hat, fur coat, dress with a bolero jacket, and a scarf. This excess of clothing represents constraints imposed by society, exemplified by the loveless, but socially acceptable marriage at home to which she is headed. As she begins to voice her own opinions and fall in love with Gilbert (Michael Redgrave), she loses layers of clothing, a subjective representation of her emotional growth and the uncovering of layers within herself. Bumping her head, which sets her journey of self-discovery in motion, results in the removal of her hat. Conversing with Mrs. Froy (Dame May Whitty) in the dining car permanently places her on the road to personal development, demonstrated by the removal of her fur coat. By the end of the film, Iris has gone from “personality to person,” and paralleling this transformation, her clothing has been diminished to an unbuttoned bolero jacket covering a dress.
Both films also exhibit the influence of German Expressionism in lighting and point-of-view shots. In Vanishes, just before Iris passes out, the view of her friends waving on the train platform becomes blurred, begins to spin, and then multiplies into two, then four of the same image within the shot. Using the German Expressionist tenet of subjective point of view, this blurriness and image duplication allows us to understand firsthand Iris’ poor mental state. The lighting in 39 Steps reflects Hannay’s (Robert Donat) psyche. As he stands with the Crofter’s wife listening to the police in the adjacent room, the shadows on the wall behind him form horizontal and vertical bars, emphasizing his current sense of entrapment. Through a subjective use of form, both films show the influence of German Expressionism. Furthermore, their comedic tone illustrates Hitchcock’s ability to successfully integrate these styles to create meaning in any genre.
In their use of montage, juxtaposition of shots, and plastic material, both films also contain distinct influences of Soviet Constructivism. In the opening of Vanishes, the juxtaposition of a shot of the crowded hotel lobby and the chiming cuckoo clock convey the frenzied madness of the situation currently unfolding in the lobby. Both shots alone are relatively meaningless, but with their juxtaposition, Hitchcock allows the audience to create a meaning that was previously nonexistent: the crowd and their demands are “cuckoo,” just as the sounds of the clock deem them to be. In 39 Steps, a montage also creates meaning, manipulating the viewer into feeling Hannay’s sense of panic. Hitchcock cuts rapidly among a series of shots: the front of the train, its whistle, its wheels, Hannay’s face, and the feet of Hannay’s pursuers. Although all of the action in the montage is simultaneous, montage enables the manipulation of time by increasing the actual duration of the process as each individual component is shown one by one. This helps to create suspense and allows us to feel the same concerns as Hannay: will the train leave before his pursuers can catch him? Thus, through the use of Soviet Constructivism in the manipulation of time and meaning, Hitchcock can create both comedic and suspenseful situations – a blend both films expertly achieve.
In Vanishes, the train whistle acts as plastic material or an objective correlative, further evidence for the influence of Soviet Constructivism. Although on its own, the whistle is simply relatively meaningless train machinery; its juxtaposition with particular scenes allows it to become a representation of the mounting frustration and panic within the characters. As Iris searches desperately out the window for some sign of Mrs. Froy exiting the train, the quicker pace of the editing (also a component of Soviet montage) builds with her sense of frustration until it erupts within her, in time with the blowing of the whistle. As an objective correlative, the whistle also serves its true purpose: a warning signal. It blows each time the audience is presented with a clue or information crucial to the story: when Mrs. Froy writes her name on the window (later necessary for proving her existence to Iris), when the patient who will become Mrs. Froy is brought onto the train, and when the name on the window disappears (Iris’ evidence for Froy’s existence along with it).
Finally, the rising popularity of documentary film-making in the early 1930s, most heavily dominated by the works of John Grierson, led to an increasing social realism in narrative film. Hitchcock’s work is no exception to this influence. Indeed, in The 39 Steps, he makes direct reference to the standard subjects of documentary film in the topic suggestions at the political rally, which include the herring fisheries (a topic of a Grierson film) and the idle rich. However, the influence of Griersonian Documentary manifests itself primarily in Hitchcock’s inclusion of topical issues of economic and social class, as well as use of locations. For example, the two cricket-obsessed Englishmen in The Lady Vanishes, in their disdain for the lower classes, act as a form of commentary on class consciousness and the hypocrisy that stems from social standing.
In the opening of 39 Steps, the representation of the raucous, cat-calling audience in the well-known English setting of the music hall also acts as a commentary on the lower classes and their behavior as an audience, specifically when contrasted with Hannay’s subdued reactions. Not only does this scene add a level of realism to the film, evidencing the influence of Griersonian documentary, but additionally, it self-reflexively gives us Hitchcock’s opinion of the “moron masses” component of the audience. Additionally, Hitchcock makes fun of the influence of social realism in his films. Declaring, “I was a poor orphan boy who never had a chance,” Hannay sarcastically constructs a stereotypical past for the murderer Pamela (Madeleine Carroll) accuses him to be. Referencing the use of social and psychological realism within suspense thrillers and tales of murder, Hitchcock emphasizes the influence Griersonian documentary has on his work, while simultaneously satirizing the effects of social realism on story-telling.
Hitchcock, a master of the cinema, drew from other film styles to construct a distinct and unique manner of filmmaking and story-telling. His primary filmic influences were that of German Expressionism, Soviet Constructivism, and Griersonian Documentary, which his work in the British Sound Period evidences. The three styles of filmmaking themselves were rooted in the production of dramatic, contemplative work, but Hitchcock extended their ideas to create meaning in both drama and comedy. While this insinuates an inability to divorce himself from this influence despite a change in style, it more resoundingly places him as an innovator of his form – a title he continued to cultivate throughout his career.
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-Reel Classic Dame

Copyright Maureen Lenker 2009