Early British Films by Alfred Hitchcock
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It’s thrilling to see Hitchcock’s first stabs at tropes, themes, and singular stylistic touches that he would fully realize in later films. —Byrony Dixon
GME is proud to distribute five lesser-known, early films by Alfred Hitchcock, made in his native England prior to his relocation to Hollywood in the early 1940s. These features find the director working in various genres outside of the thriller territory that eventually made him a household name and earned him the moniker “The Master of Suspense.”
Over 40 years since his death, Alfred Hitchcock remains one of the most famous directors in film history. The auteur behind classic suspense thrillers like 1954’s REAR WINDOW, 1958’s dreamlike psychological thriller VERTIGO (1958), and the proto-slasher PSYCHO (1960), Hitchcock became a household name in the 1950s and ‘60s as the industry’s “Master of Suspense”; he also made himself a weekly presence in America’s living rooms with his anthology TV series ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS.
Prior to his career in Hollywood (beginning with 1940’s REBECCA), Hitchcock worked extensively in England as a young director-for-hire. These early films are largely overlooked entries in the director’s oeuvre. Fortunately, they have been rediscovered and reappraised in recent years as key works that convey a precociously talented filmmaker and soon-to-be Hollywood heavyweight getting his feet wet, working across myriad genres, and developing the meticulous filmmaking techniques that would become his trademarks.
Early in his career, he signed with the newly formed British International Pictures, where he became the highest-paid director in England. In conjunction with Kino Lorber, GME is pleased to present five rare films from Hitchcock's work at this studio to the North American university market as Digital Site Licenses. These lesser-known Hitchcock films were made by the director between the success of THE LODGER (1927), a murder mystery centering around a serial killer, and BLACKMAIL (1929), which was released in both silent and sound versions. The four films that Hitchcock directed between these two productions are visually dynamic silent movies: the atmospheric boxing drama THE RING (1927), sprightly comedies THE FARMER'S WIFE and CHAMPAGNE (both from 1928), and a love triangle set on the Isle of Man, THE MANXMAN (1929), as well as the early sound era film THE SKIN GAME (1931), a melodrama about feuding families, that was also produced by British International.
Coincidentally, THE MANXMAN is screening this weekend, on Saturday, January 11th, at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival.
Early British Films by Alfred Hitchcock
GME currently distributes each of these five early features by Alfred Hitchcock as Digital Site Licenses to the North American university market.
Alfred Hitchcock’s THE RING is an engrossing, if unconventional, entry in his oeuvre: a fraught romantic drama set in the world of English boxing.
Like THE RING (1927) before it, 1928’s THE FARMER’S WIFE — a romantic comedy about a lonesome man searching for “Mrs. Right” — is a fascinating outlier for the director who would come to be known around the world as the “Master of Suspense.”
Another rare comedy in the Hitchcock canon, 1928’s CHAMPAGNE stars “Britain’s Queen of Happiness” Betty Balfour as a young woman forced to find employment after losing out on her father’s fortune.
Alfred Hitchcock’s final silent film chronicles a dramatic love triangle on the Isle of Man, and is based on the popular 1894 novel THE MANXMAN by Hall Caine.
Based on the 1920 play of the same name by John Galsworthy, Alfred Hitchcock’s THE SKIN GAME is a fraught drama about two feuding families and the disastrous consequences of their rivalry.
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