The Men Who Talked Too Much

Dialogue Analysis of Hitchcock’s Perfect Crime Films

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This article analyzes the function of dialogue in Alfred Hitchcock’s perfect crime films. From the earliest days of film to the present, many directors and critics have regarded cinema as a purely visual medium, and dialogue has been placed outside the aesthetics. In recent years, however, such image-centered view has been modified and academic interest in film dialogue has increased. Based on this critical background, this article puts dialogue analysis into practice in Alfred Hitchcock’s films. Despite the fact that Hitchcock repeatedly asserted the superiority of the visual aspects of cinema over dialogue, his films often rely on actors’ speech and make use of a variety of dialogue techniques. Especially in his crime films involving the subject of the perfect murder, dialogue not only plays important roles for narrative communication and character revelation but also provides thematic concerns. So this article discusses the characteristics of dialogue in the genre and provides a detailed textual analysis of Strangers on a Train (1951) as a case study.