Blonde Bombshells
The Trademark: Hitchcock’s leading ladies are invariably blonde bombshells, and often appear to be prim and proper – a façade which quickly reveals them as thieves, aꦓdulterers and kleptomaniacs.
Seen In: Grace Kelly in Rear Window , Kim Novak in Vertigo , Tippi Hedren in The Birds , Ingrid Bergamn in Spellbound etc.
How To Recreate It: Head down your local IKEA, which if we know anything about IK𒅌EA should be packed full of Scandinavian beauties.
Find the slightly damaged one who can’𒉰t help but steal, and you’re away.
Director Cameo
The Trademark: Hitch couldn’t help but throw himself among the pigeons, turning up at some point in almost every film he ever made, from obscure blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moments to long ꧂shots.
Seen In: Being bothered by a small boy as he reads a book on the Underground in Blackmail , missing the bus in North By Northwest , boarding the train in Strangers On A Train.
How To Recreate It: Shor🦩t of resurrecting the chap and being responsible for an awesome undead Hitchcock roaming the earth, a cardboard cut out should suffice.
Famous Landmarks
The Trademark: Hitchcock’s finales were finely orchestrated set-pieces often involving famous landmarks.
Seen In: From the domed roof of the British Museum in Blackmail to the Statue of Liberty in Sabotuer , The Royal Albert Hall in The Man Who Knew Too Much to Mount Rushmore in North By Northwest
How To Recreate It: Filming at most mඣajor landmarks is going to be tricky. It’s mostly illegal for one, unless you have a permit, which you likely will not.
Best thing to do is get a small handheld camera, p🐓retend you and your actors are tourists and run like buggery if ꦑyou get caught.
Technical Skill
The Trademark: The Jowel™ was always pushing the boundaries of cinema, constantly striving to develop new technique꧃s and pioneering several.
Seen In: POV shots in Spellbound , using a giant hand and props to keep perspective. Use of the ‘Dolly Zoom’ in Vertigo . Clever editing made Rope appear to be a single take.
How To Recreate It: Get ⛄jiggy with your in-camera effects. A dolly zoom can be achieved by walking forwards and zooming out.
An office ꦗfavour🍌ite is the classic ‘click your fingers and disappear’ trick that makes it appear you have teleported.
Mommy Issues
The Trademark: Characters in Hitchcock films are often involved in highly unusual relationships with their mothers🍸.
Seen In: Roger Thornhill’s abrasive relationship with his mother in North By Northwest . Sebastian’s meddlesome mother in Notorious . Oh, and that lovely Norman Bates in Psycho .
How To Recreate It: Sadly, totalfilm.com don’t need any help in this department, after b🐈eing🅷 maternally disowned for snubbing a decent career in favour of film journalism.
Perhaps you could come work f🌜or us, and then yours might hate you to𒆙o.
Ordinary Man In An Extraordinary Situation
The Trademark: The protagonists in 'Alf’s Joints' are often average middle ඣclass types, victims of circumstance, who rise to the occas𝕴ion and become heroes.
Seen In: Joel McCrea in Foreign Correspondant , Jimmy Stewart in North By Northwest , Leslie Banks and Edna Best in The Man Who Knew Too Much .
How To Recreate It: You need to find the most wholly average person available. Do you have a frien൩d with a bit of Jimmy Stewart/Bogey/Tom Hanks/Shia The Beef about them? Cast them, and the rest will take care of itself. Kinda.
Single Location
The Trademark: The Cock often set his film in a small space, as a technical challenge as much as a dramatic device of a budgetary concernও.
Seen In: The lifeboat in Lifeboat , the apartment in Dial M for Murder , the apartment in Rear Window , the apartment in Rope .
How To Recreate It: Pick a place - preferably a tiny, uncommonly ༒used place - and build your story around that.
A tree house perhaps, one which no-one can leave asᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ there are zombies waiting on the ground, zombies that are never seen… Someone should seriously make this film. Seriously.
The MacGuffin
The Trademark: An item of value which is of extreme importance to the cha🐻racters, who all want to possess it.
Seen In: The ‘Top Secret Plans’ in The 39 Steps , the ‘microfilm’ in North By Northwest , Guy’s Lighter in Stranger’s On A Trai n , the stolen $40,000 in Psycho .
How To Recreate It: Look around you right now, wherever you are – and pick the first obje🎐ct you see.
The more ღtrivial the item the better. A stapler for example, which has staples made from a top secret alloy or something.
Or just stick with zombies.
