Quotes from Alfred Hitchcock

What is drama but life with the dull bits cut out.

The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder.

If I won't be myself, who will?

Always make the audience suffer as much as possible.

I've never been very keen on women who hang their sex round their neck like baubles. I think it should be discovered. It's more interesting to discover the sex in a woman than it is to have it thrown at you, like a Marilyn Monroe or those types. To me they are rather vulgar and obvious.

I'm a writer and, therefore, automatically a suspicious character.

I have a perfect cure for a sore throat: cut it.

Revenge is sweet and not fattening.

I can't read fiction without visualizing every scene. The result is it becomes a series of pictures rather than a book.

Seeing a murder on television... can help work off one's antagonisms. And if you haven't any antagonisms, the commercials will give you some.

The paperback is very interesting but I find it will never replace the hardcover book -- it makes a very poor doorstop.

Blondes make the best victims. They're like virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints.

A glimpse into the world proves that horror is nothing other than reality.

In feature films the director is God; in documentary films God is the director.

I'm a typed director. If I made Cinderella, the audience would immediately be looking for a body in the coach.

T.V. has brought murder back into the home where it belongs.

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. I have prepared one of my own. I have placed some rather large samples of dynamite, gunpowder, and nitroglycerin. My time capsule is set to go off in the year 3000. It will show them what we are really like.

Suspense is like a woman. The more left to the imagination, the more the excitement. ... The conventional big-bosomed blonde is not mysterious. And what could be more obvious than the old black velvet and pearls type? The perfect 'woman of mystery' is one who is blonde, subtle and Nordic. ... Although I do not profess to be an authority on women, I fear that the perfect title [for a movie], like the perfect woman is difficult to find.

There is nothing so good as a burial at sea. It is simple, tidy, and not very incriminating.

I'm sure anyone who likes a good crime, provided it is not the victim.

I'm full of fears and I do my best to avoid difficulties and any kind of complications. I like everything around me to be clear as crystal and completely calm.

In many of the films now being made, there is very little cinema: they are mostly what I call 'photographs of people talking.' When we tell a story in cinema we should resort to dialogue only when it's impossible to do otherwise. I always try to tell a story in the cinematic way, through a succession of shots and bits of film in between.

There is nothing to winning, really. That is, if you happen to be blessed with a keen eye, an agile mind, and no scruples whatsoever.

I'm not against the police; I'm just afraid of them.