Remastering the Master: Hitchcock after Feminism

The essay examines the work of several prominent scholars of Alfred Hitchcock films and argues that the political ground staked out by queer and feminist critics of these films has become increasingly evacuated by male critics who, while often appropriating the insights of queer and feminist theory, attempt to restore Hitchcock to a position of mastery untroubled by the ideological contradictions present in the director’s work. The essay seeks to decenter Hitchcock’s authority by privileging female spectatorship and by proposing the site of production as an area in which women have made their mark.