h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

One of the main reasons his films are so full of suspense is because of the amount of scenes that rely on visuals rather than dialogue. Whole scenes go by without a single spoken word, which make them all the more tense. Just look at the infamous shower scene and subsequent clean-up process that Norman Bates does meticulously. The only dialogue being 'Mother, no! Blood! Blood!' delivered off-screen after Norman 'discovers' that his mother has killed again.

This tension often makes the audience almost complicit with whatever's going on. We're repulsed by the murder in Psycho, but almost will Norman on not to leave any evidence behind. We know that Marnie is committing a crime when she robs her employer's safe, but as she sneaks out of the office we don't want her to be heard by the cleaner (who we don't realise is actually deaf anyway until the end of the scene). And in Frenzy, the second murder happens in absolute silence until the camera pulls coyly away from the murderer's bedroom, down the stairs and out into the noisy streets of Covent garden, by which time we're thiking 'if that poor girl screams, no-one's going to even hear her...'

That's one fo the reasons Hitch was the master. He didn't just show us violence and crime; he made us a part of it, albeit as voyeurs rather than participants.