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I try to offset any tendency towards the macabre with humour. As I see it, this is a typically English form of humour. It's a piece with such jokes as the one about the man who was being led to the gallows to be hanged. He looked at the trap door in the gallows, which was flimsily constructed, and he asked in some alarm, 'I say, is that thing safe?

Alfred Hitchcock

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Alfred Hitchcock
Age: 80 †
Born: 1899
Born: August 13
Died: 1980
Died: April 29
Cinematographer
Director
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Editor
Film Producer
Screenwriter
Television Director
Television Producer
Alfred Joseph Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Hitchcock
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Jokes
Constructed
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Piece
Trap
Macabre
Thing
Door
Traps
Offset
Trying
Looked
Humour
Gallows
Men
Asked
Tendency
Hanged
Safe
Tendencies
Alarm
Doors
English
Alarms
Humor
Towards
Typically

More quotes by Alfred Hitchcock

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I like stories with lots of psychology.
Alfred Hitchcock
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Someone once told me that every minute a murder occurs, so I don't want to waste your time, I know you want to go back to work.
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Give them pleasure - the same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare.
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We seem to have a compulsion these days to bury time capsules in order to give those people living in the next century or so some idea of what we are like.
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In the documentary the basic material has been created by God, whereas in the fiction film the director is a God he must create life.
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Never turn your back on a friend.
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For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake.
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This weapon [an ax] is primitive but effective. And it's also guaranteed to be fifty-percent painless. You see, it takes two people to operate, and the person at this end [the handle] doesn't feel a thing.
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Making a film means, first of all, to tell a story. That story can be an improbable one, but it should never be banal. It must be dramatic and human. What is drama, after all, but life with the dull bits cut out?
Alfred Hitchcock
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Television is like the American toaster, you push the button and the same thing pops up everytime.
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Man does not live by murder alone. He needs affection, approval, encouragement and, occasionally, a hearty meal.
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To make a great film you need three things - the script, the script and the script.
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Suspense is like a woman. The more left to the imagination, the more the excitement.
Alfred Hitchcock
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There is nothing so good as a burial at sea. It is simple, tidy, and not very incriminating.
Alfred Hitchcock
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A woman, I always say, should be like a good suspense movie: The more left to the imagination, the more excitement there is. This should be her aim - to create suspense, to let a man discover things about her without her having to tell him.
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Conversation is the enemy of good wine and food.
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I am a typed director. If I made Cinderella, the audience would immediately be looking for a body in the coach.
Alfred Hitchcock
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In the old days villains had moustaches and kicked the dog. Audiences are smarter today. They don't want their villain to be thrown at them with green limelight on his face. They want an ordinary human being with failings.
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Our original title, you know, was `The Man in Lincoln`s Nose`. Couldn`t use it, though. They also wouldn`t let us shoot people on Mount Rushmore. Can`t deface a national monument. And it`s a pity, too, because I had a wonde.
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One must never set up a murder. They must happen unexpectedly, as in life.
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