Alfred Hitchcock filmography Code which at the time limited such scenes to three seconds. In 1948, Hitchcock directed "Rope" which starred James Stewart. The film was his first in Technicolor and is remembered for its use of long takes to make the film appear to be a single continuous shot. Three years later he directed "Strangers on a Train" (1951). Hitchcock collaborated with Grace Kelly on three films: "Dial M for Murder" (1954), "Rear Window" (1954) and "To Catch a Thief" (1955). For "Rear Window", Hitchcock received a nomination for Best Director at the Academy Awards. 1955 marked his debut on television as
Alfred Hitchcock (May Whitty), a British spy posing as a governess, disappears on a train journey through the fictional European country of Bandrika. The film saw Hitchcock receive the 1939 New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Director, the only time he won an award for his direction. Benjamin Crisler, the "New York Times" film critic, wrote in June 1938: "Three unique and valuable institutions the British have that we in America have not: Magna Carta, the Tower Bridge and Alfred Hitchcock, the greatest director of screen melodramas in the world." David O. Selznick signed Hitchcock to a seven-year contract beginning