Hitchcock: Terror and Suspense
On Art and Aesthetics listens as Alfred Hitchcock describes the difference between terror and suspense:
In February 1949, Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980) had a piece published in the Good Housekeeping magazine called “The Enjoyment of Fear” where he distinguished between the feelings and moods of “terror” and “suspense” with the help of vivid illustrations. The essay is included in a book called Hitchcock on Hitchcock: Selected Writings and Interviews. The legendary director writes:
Fear in the cinema is my special field, and I have, perhaps dogmatically, but I think with good cause, split cinematic fear into two broad categories – terror and suspense.
He gives examples to make the distinction definite:
Walking down a dimly lighted street in the late hours of the night, with no other people about, a person may find his mind playing strange tricks. The silence, the loneliness, and the gloom may set the scene for fear.
Suddenly a dark form thrusts itself before the lonely walker. Terror. It does not matter that the form was a waving branch, a newspaper picked up by a gust of wind, or simply an oddly shaped shadow unexpectedly coming into view. Whatever it was, it produced its moment of terror.
The same walker, on the same dark street, might have no inclination toward fear. The sound of footsteps coming from somewhere behind might cause the late stroller to become curious, then uneasy, then fearful. The walker stops, the footsteps are not heard; the pace is increased, so also the tempo of the thin sounds coming out of the night. Suspense. The echo of his own steps? Probably. But suspense.
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A really entertaining article that Alfred Hitchcock wrote about his way of working, in which he chatted out of the bag of tricks of a good filmmaker. 👍 Linguistically very well implemented, as he explains to the reader, using just a few simple examples, his view of the difference between tension and terror. It is easy to understand how Mr. Hitchcock knows how to use these nuances very skillfully in his films every time. 📺 Since he really masters his craft, not only his films, but also reading this article are simply a pleasure. 🙂
ReplyDeleteAnd yet I have to disagree to Mr. Hitchcock. 🤔 His statements may apply to cinema goers, racing drivers 🏍, mountain climbers and other adrenaline junkies, but what the audience or athletes (sometimes very intensely) feel there, I would never describe as real fear. It's just tension, excitement and adrenaline rush. Even if the physical symptoms of the audience, are similar to those of real onset fear, they have hardly anything to do with each other, and cannot just be equated, as Mr. Hitchcock did in his brief explanations.
I only agree ✅ with Mr. Hitchcock's statements to the extent, that they relate to his specialty in cinema, but it is simply wrong to say, that the tingling felt in the cinema, is the same as real existential fear that threatens the being 😱. It is not so.