Are you a fan of the seventh art? Most people are. Whether it's romance, animation, horror, comedy, suspense or thriller, there's a film genre for every taste. And that is precisely what the 5th of November celebrates: the love of cinema.
Cinema has developed over the centuries and thanks to the contribution of various inventors. Did you know that it was in Paris in 1895 that the Lumière brothers held the first public cinema session with a cinematograph? Of Greek origin, the term comes from 'cine', which means movement, and 'àgrafo', which means to record. This is how the French brothers showed recorded moving images to about 30 spectators.
A few years earlier, the photographer Edward Muybridge had discovered the possibility of catching the phases of a movement by capturing continuous images, which when viewed sequentially at high speed showed perfectly the movement that had been recorded.
Jumping to the beginning of the 20th century, Georges Mèliés introduced theatrical performance to cinema, bringing the seventh art closer to what we know today. With an adaptation of Jules Verne's Journey to the Moon, Mèliés elevated cinema with the use of special effects, at a time when the cinema was still black and white. From then on, the evolution continued and cinema grew as a way of telling stories, sharing cultures and spreading information.
Nowadays, cinema exists in several dimensions and has the ability to influence our emotions and our thoughts, deserving to be celebrated all over the world. For our part, we have chosen as a way of celebration to tell you about the master of suspense: Alfred Hitchcock.
For many, Hitchcock needs no introduction. He was born in London in 1899 and had a career spanning over 60 years and 53 films. Throughout his life, he gave many interviews and made a large number of cameos-appearances in films.
Hitchcock started in the film industry in 1919. Eight years later, he was already creating his first successful film, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, which would come to conceive the genre of suspense. His influence was (and still is) so great that he created his own style called Hitchcockian style, which is characterised by the use of camera movement that imitates the viewer's vision, as if he were a voyeur.
With the book from Taschen, Alfred Hitchcock The complete films, you will get to know more about the man who invented the chilling, the thrilling, the shocking, the excruciating and the surprising suspense. In the 225 pages of this work are various texts, illustrations and photographs that will take you through the life and work of Hitchcock, from the backstage of the hit films Vertigo, Rear Window and Psycho, to the devices he used to induce fear. You'll also discover quotes from the master himself, which give an interesting insight into his thinking, wicked humour and personality.
This work edited by Paul Duncan, a film historian who has also produced volumes on Charlie Chaplin, Ingmar Bergman and the Star Wars saga, is easily a cinematic reference book you'll want to read from one end to the other. Celebrate World Cinema Day your way, but always in the company of Taschen.
