Alfred Hitchcock is known as the master of suspense, and he’s one of my favorite classic film directors, creating some fantastically memorable scenes and characters. One of my absolute favorite sequences in all of cinema is in North by Northwest , when Leo G. Carroll, the spy handler, explains the reasons behind the espionage operation they’re asking Cary Grant to help with, and the entire speech is drowned out by the roar of airplane engines. Hitchcock knew the importance of pulling the audience into the story in such a way that the plot details don’t really matter if the rest of the film is compelling through acting, music, and shot composition.

Article continues after advertisement

While a great many of Hitchcock’s films are of the thriller persuasion, he dabbled in other genres as well. Over the course of his long and varied career, he directed films that explored everything from spies and political thrillers to romance to dark comedies.…