This affectionate, if somewhat speculative biographical drama suggests it wasn’t always easy being ‘The Master of Suspense’. Anthony Hopkins gets the voice just right, captures corpulent Hitchcock’s oddly dainty physicality, and delivers a touching portrait of a man whose cinematic genius was speckled with telling character flaws.

The mounting pressure around the 1960 filming of Psycho – a risk-taking enterprise he funded from his own pocket – brings out Hitch the visionary storyteller but also the sinister sexual fantasist, while prompting a telling estrangement from his closest colleague and support, long-suffering wife Alma.

Helen Mirren truly sparkles as the razor-sharp creative associate reluctantly playing the public role of ‘the little woman’, as Sacha Gervasi’s film threads an unconventional love story through its wry insider’s peek behind the scenes at the Bates Motel. Scarlett Johansson’s portrayal of Janet Leigh as a consummate pro features strongly, but it’s the Hopkins-Mirren double-act that’s the key to this sideways glance at the price of creativity. (Notes by Trevor Johnston.)

Our Alfred Hitchcock Retrospective continues throughout February from 2nd to 27th.