Sir Alfred Hitchcock

Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock was a British film director and producer who was born on the 13 August 1899 in Leytonstone, London. He was the son of William Hitchcock, an East end greengrocer and his wife Emma. He was raised a strict catholic and went to the Saint Ignatius College, which was run by Jesuits.

His first job out of the family business was working for Henley Telegraph and Cable Company as an estimator in 1915. Within this year, his interest for movies grew, and he frequently visited the cinema and read US trade journals.

As his interest in films were so great, he learnt that Lasky were opening a studio in London, in which he managed to get the job as title designer, where he did this for the next two years.

In 1923, he got his first job as directing when the director of "Always Tell Your Wife", fell ill, so Hitchcock completed the movie. As he did such a fantastic job, and impressed the studio chiefs, they gave him his first directing assignment which was "Number 13", but before he could finish the film, the studio closed its British operation. Because it closed, Hitchcock lost his job, but was soon hired by Michael Balcon, working as an assistant director, but did much more than this; writer, title designer, and art director. Hitchcock was then given the chance to direct a German/British co-production called "The Pleasure Garden", after working on several films in the company. He then directed his first trademark film "The Lodger", in 1926, also marrying his wife Alma Reville, on December 2nd. They had one child, Patricia Hitchcock born 7th July 1928.

He also made success on the films "The Lady Vanishes" in 1938 and "Jamaica Inn" in 1939 in which some were also made famous in the USA. This is when an American producer, David O.Selznick got in contact, wanting to work with him. Hitchcock and his family moved to America and directed an adaption of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca in 1940.

After making the film Saboteur (1942), his films were starting to be called after his by film companies; Alfred Hitchcock' Psycho, Alfred Hitchcock's Family Plot,

On the 7th March 1979, Hitchcock was awarded the AFI Life Achievement Award.

He started writing a screenplay called "The Short Night" with Ernest Lehman, but fired him to hire young screenwriter David Freeman, who re-wrote the whole script. This film was never made, as his health was getting worse, so Freeman published the script after his death.

In 1979, Hitchcock was knighted, making him Sir Alfred Hitchcock, but a year later, on the 29th April 1980, he died peacefully in his sleep at 9.17AM due to renal failure in Bel Air, Los Angeles.

The films he has worked on... 

This information is off the website; http://hitchcock.tv/mov/hfilm.html












































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