One of cinema's greatest directors, a virtuoso visual artist, and a genius of the suspense genre, Alfred Hitchcock (1899โ1980) is universally known for such masterpieces as Strangers on a Train, Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, and The Birds. The author, a distinguished film critic and friend of Hitchcock's, enjoyed his full cooperation. Based on numerous interviews, with photos from the private family albums, and an in-depth study of the making of his last film, this biography of the director is as intriguing, revealing, perverse, and entertaining as any Hitchcock classic.
Amazon.com Review
It's likely that readers who have watched many of Alfred Hitchcock's films can't help but have noticed how frequently he depicts fetishism, sadism, and voyeurism. Because Hitchcock was a reclusive man and a guarded interview subject, almost everyone who writes about him turns to his work for insight into his life. These writers generally conclude that the director himself was possessed by the very pathologies that resound in his movies.
But John Russell Taylor didn't have to go that route. He wrote this biography with the participation and blessings of the man himself. In Hitch , Taylor admits that his subject often projects his fantasies onto the screen. He also provides a good deal of insight into Hitchcock's domineering, obsessively courteous demeanor. But the focus here is on the details of Hitchcock's life, the preparation and production of his movies, and his relationships with the countless cinematic luminaries who worked with him, including Ingrid Bergman, Cary Grant, Grace Kelly, and James Stewart. --Raphael Shargel
From Library Journal
Though biographies of the great director abound, most concentrate primarily on his career-making Hollywood blockbusters. Taylor's work, however, covers at great length Hitchcock's early, lesser-known British films. This remains "a worthy addition to the literature on Hitchcock" (LJ 10/15/78).
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