If modern thrillers leave you scrolling instead of squirming, Alfred Hitchcock’s arrival on Netflix this June is the cinematic reset you didn’t know you needed. The streamer is spotlighting the Master of Suspense through a curated collection that spans his career-defining classics, from voyeuristic whodunits to avian apocalypses.
It’s all part of Netflix’s six-week event, HITCH! The Original Cinema Influencer, running at New York’s Paris Theater from May 16 to June 29. But for those not in NYC, seven Hitchcock thrillers have just dropped on the platform, with the collection expanding to include more films from his collection in June. And they are all killers. This collection of psychological powder kegs still explodes.
Ready to stream? Start with these five.
Top 5 Alfred Hitchcock Movies To Watch on Netflix
1) Rear Window (1954)
Before true crime podcasts and TikTok sleuths, there was Rear Window. James Stewart plays Jeffries, a sidelined photographer who passes time spying on his neighbors. That is, until he suspects one may have murdered his wife.
The entire film unfolds from a single apartment set, yet Hitchcock makes it feel like an open-air pressure cooker. From voyeurism to paranoia, every shot is calibrated for maximum dread. This is a crash course in suspense.
Where to watch: Netflix
2) Vertigo (1958)
Vertigo is less of a film and more of a descent. Stewart returns as a retired detective hired to follow a woman (Kim Novak) who may…or may not…be losing her mind. But it’s he who spirals.
Hitchcock’s use of dolly zooms, saturated color, and Bernard Herrmann’s eerie score creates a fever dream of obsession and identity.
Where to watch: Netflix
3) The Birds (1963)
This one pecks at your nerves. In The Birds, Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) travels to a quaint town for a romantic gesture, but things go violently south when birds begin attacking humans without warning or reason. Hitchcock ditches logic to amplify the fear.
The absence of a musical score during key scenes? Deafening. The result? A primal, lingering terror that still soars above modern horror fare.
Where to watch: Netflix
4) Frenzy (1972)
In Frenzy, Hitchcock swaps elegance for grit. Set in a seedy 1970s London, it follows a wrongly accused man trying to clear his name while the real “Necktie Murderer” prowls the streets.
It’s Hitchcock unfiltered: more violent, more cynical, and incredibly sharp. With long tracking shots and dark humor, this is the director at his late-career peak.
Where to watch: Netflix
5) The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956)
A vacation turns deadly in this remake of Hitchcock’s own 1934 film. Stewart and Doris Day play a couple caught in an international assassination plot.
It’s high-stakes espionage wrapped in domestic drama, climaxing with one of Hitchcock’s most tense sequences set in London’s Royal Albert Hall.
Bonus: Doris Day singing “Que Sera, Sera” isn’t just iconic; it’s climactic.
Where to watch: Netflix
From voyeuristic windows to birds gone berserk, these films are reminders that Hitchcock didn’t just master suspense. He invented the modern thrill.
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