Alfred Hitchcock: A Brief Life
Written by Peter Ackroyd
Narrated by Gildart Jackson
5/5
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Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this audiobook
A gripping short biography of the extraordinary Alfred Hitchock, the master of suspense.
Alfred Hitchcock was a strange child. Fat, lonely, burning with fear and ambition, his childhood was an isolated one, scented with fish from his father's shop. Afraid to leave his bedroom, he would plan great voyages, using railway timetables to plot an exact imaginary route across Europe. So how did this fearful figure become the one of the most respected film directors of the twentieth century?
As an adult, Hitch rigorously controlled the press's portrait of him, drawing certain carefully selected childhood anecdotes into full focus and blurring all others out. In this quick-witted portrait, Ackroyd reveals something more: a lugubriously jolly man fond of practical jokes, who smashes a once-used tea cup every morning to remind himself of the frailty of life. Iconic film stars make cameo appearances, just as Hitch did in his own films: Grace Kelly, Cary Grant, and James Stewart despair of his detached directing style and, perhaps most famously of all, Tippi Hedren endures cuts and bruises from a real-life fearsome flock of birds.
Alfred Hitchcock wrests the director's chair back from the master of control and discovers what lurks just out of sight, in the corner of the shot.
Peter Ackroyd
Peter Ackroyd is an award-winning novelist, as well as a broadcaster, biographer, poet and historian. He is the author of the acclaimed non-fiction bestsellers, Thames: Sacred River and London: The Biography, as well as the History of England series. He holds a CBE for services to literature and lives in London.
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Reviews for Alfred Hitchcock
1 rating1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Interesting and detailed account of a true genius.
Alfred Hitchcock transcends art, and remains the standard for directing a thriller. His movies were deep and complex and maintained lives of their own; they always had traces of fun and amusement, tastefully and purposely implemented to remind you it's just a movie. He had the ability to completely remove you from your reality, and replace it with his.