Hitchcock Week: The 39 Steps

Hitchcock Week is moving in stride and we will tackle another forgotten gem.  A story of espionage, murder, conspiracy and in general a thrilling concept to the likes we have not seen in cinema because the formula was lost.   Of course that could also just be my bitter theory regarding modern spy thrillers. So grab that bucket of popcorn with the real imitation buttery flavor, over ice your coke and avoid the row with the necking teenagers.   This is The 39 Steps.

 

Great Title Card, right?

There are 20 million spoilers in this island and I get to be chained to you.

At the London Music Hall Theatre, Richard Hannay (Robert Donat of Over Night, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Ghost Goes West, The Citadel, The Young Mr. Pitt, Vacation from Marriage and The Magic Box) witnesses a demonstration of the recall of stage act “Mr. Memory” (Wylie Watson of Leave It to Me, Radio Lover, Queer Cargo, Pack Up Your Troubles, Danny Boy The Saint Meets the Tiger and The Sundowners) a man with an Eidetic memory explaining something in detail when gunfire erupts from the crowd causing a mass panic in the building.  Hannay finds himself pressed against a frightened girl named Annabella Smith (Lucie Mannheim of Danton, Madame Wants No Children, The Bear, Yellow Canary, The Mistress, The Paris Express, Ich und Du and You Can No Longer Remain Silent) who talks him into taking her back to his apartment.  Fast mover is gal, eh?  

And now, a speech from the Minister of Silly Walks.

There the only revealing is that she is a spy being pursued by assassins and she has uncovered a plot to steal British Intelligence secrets, conducted by a man miss the top joint of one of his fingers.   She speaks of the “39 steps” but clearly she doesn’t go into giving the meaning behind it.  That evening Annabella bursts through Hannay’s bedroom with a knife in the back telling him to escape while he still can.  Clutched in her hand is a map of Scotland with a town circled.   Fleeing his apartment disguised as a milkman Hannay makes his way to the train yard for Scotland as a manhunt has been issued for him.   Can Hannay clear his name; circumvent this league of assassins and save the day?

I just have a quick couple of comments to be made about this film.  Filmed in glorious Black and White via 35 mm Spherical, Lime Grove Studios gets another visit for most of the interior shots but surprisingly enough several of the Scottish village shots were done in Edinburgh and Glen Coe but most of the exterior of the village itself was conducted at Welwyn Studios,Welwyn  Garden City, Hertfordshire, England.  This studio was known for some of the earliest works of both Boris Karloff and Bela Legosi.  This same studio shot Richard Attenborough’s tenth major motion picture Brighton Rock.

Ahh, the healing power of booze.

The film is compelling, clever, witty, dark and downright confusing.  Make no mistake folks, if you need to have a bathroom break hit pause.   To miss a scene means you are out of the loop of this impressive body of work.

Hitchcock Week: The Man That Knew Too Much

Back again Hitchcock fans and I apologize for the delay but family emergency has been met and things are scoping very nicely.  I felt this next film is a bit of a lost gem.  A diamond in the rough as it were; many of you no doubt are familiar with its 1956 remake; I felt we should explore the original and see it for what it was.  So grab your seats, enjoy your beverage and movie snacks.   This is The Man Who Knew Too Little.

 

Now dear, we're English, so no emotions.

You know, to a man with a heart as soft as mine, there’s nothing sweeter than a touching spoiler.

Take everything that you know of the remake with Doris Day and James Stewart and toss it right out the window because other than the title, the original’s tone, setting and plot details are vastly different.

Bob Lawrence (Leslie Banks of The Most Dangerous Game, The Fire Raisers, Red Ensign, Wings of the Morning, Cyrano de Bergerac and Henry V) and his lovely wife Jill (Edna Best of Tilly of Bloomsbury, The Calendar, South Riding and The Ghost and Mrs. Muir) are an English couple on vacation in Switzerland with their daughter Betty.  Jill is partaking in a clay pigeon shooting contest when they are befriended by a Frenchman Louis Bernard (Pierre Fresnay of Marius, Fanny, Street of Shadows Le Duel,  Justice is Done and The Hunchback of Notre Dame) who happens to be staying at the same hotel as they.  Louis and Jill are dancing and Jill sees Louis assassinated before her eyes.  Before passing on he gives them both some imperative information to be delivered to the British Consul.    

The diabolical dwarf and dunderhead.

However before the Lawrences can deliver these documents the lead assassin Abbott (Peter Lorre of M, High and Low, Mad Love, Crime and Punishment, Secret Agent, The Maltese Falcon and Casablanca) kidnaps the couples’ daughter to ensure their silence.  Unable to go to the police, they return to England and run down leads only to discover the assassins have a head of state to liquidate during a concert.   Now how many of your parents would try to thwart an assassination and come looking for you?   Let’s face it; some of our parents have left us at the store by accident.  

Moving right along I have a few tidbits about the film.    Studio locations were the order for filming in the Alps could get pricey so Switzerland was actually Lime Studios of Lime Grove, Shepard’s Bush, London, England, UK.   A studio made famous as the building blocks of Hitchcock’s first major motion pictures as well as the studio for the comedy Steptoe and Son and Doctor Who.  The scenes of the assassination attempt in Royal Albert Hall were most definitely the Real McCoy. 

I say, old boy it is a trifle nippy out.

While the plot lines are very similar in both versions, I felt Lorre’s performance compared to Daniel Gelin’s was more disturbing and sinister overall.  His idle comments had great undertone coming from a man that had no qualms about killing a young girl and that just sent chills up and down my spine.   I believed Lorre would follow through with his implied threats more so than Gelin’s version.   Both films are equally enjoyable but I must say I do fancy the original.

Hitchcock Week: Murder!

Greetings film fans and movie goers.  I would like to talk to you about…murder.  Well to be more accurate I would like to talk about Alfred Hitchcock’s portrayal of such.  The man who brought us the key plot element or elements that is referred as: the MacGuffin.  That important element or plot device that is crucial in Act 1; but is never specifically declared how vital it truly is.  The need to make the camera to travel as though the viewer was actually in the room witnessing all that is happening with a neck movement.  With that notion I ask you to turn off your mobile devices, don’t talk through the movie and please pick up your trash after the viewing.  This is Murder!.

 

It's a frameup, see? A fix! A rig!

Spoilers ought to be ashamed of themselves, kicking up all that racket at this time of night.

Based on the novel and play Enter Sir John by Clemence Dane and Helen Simpson, director Alfred Hitchcock shows us how quickly the human animal can turn on one another very succinctly with this film as a young actress Diana Baring (Norah Baring of Escape from Dartmoor, Two Worlds, Mystery at the Villa Rose, The Lyons Mail and The House of Trent) from a traveling theatre troupe is found, dizzy, confused and with blood up and down her clothes standing over the body of another young actress.  She claims to have no memory of the crime that was committed and police automatically assume some sort of rivalry and arrest her on the spot.  Diana is hoisted off the station where she is then interrogated for several hours.   The police feel she is holding back key information that is essential to the case but they feel they have enough for a positive case so on to the kangaroo court with her!

Beg yer pardon, milord but what is an executive transvestite?

  

As the jury box is almost certain this was a case of petty jealousy gone too far and one or two of them feel she is mentally deranged, a juror, Sir John Menier (Herbert Marshall of Till We Meet Again, A Woman Rebels, Angel, Breakfast for Two and Mad About Music) seems confident that she is in fact innocent but is harassed into voting guilty along with the rest of the jury.   Diana is shanghaied to the hoosegow and waits to be hung…by the neck until she is dead, dead, dead!!!!   

 

Sir John feels awful, having recommended the traveling troupe to Diana so she may enjoy some of life’s experiences feels compelled to prove her innocence and with the aid of stage manager Ted Markham (Edward Chapman of Things to Come, X: The Unknown and Champion House) and his wife Doucie (Phyllis Konstam of Champagne, Escape, The Skin Game, A Gentleman of Paris and The Forgotten Factor) to re-examine the evidence and find the true culprit of this heinous act.    Will they find our killer and if so will it be in time?

 

Must remain British and bland...ahh much better.

I have just a few technical aspects of the film to share.  Shot in 35 mm Spherical Black and White and of course recorded in mono this film was recently restored and remastered prints for DVD by Lionsgate Home Entertainment in 2007.   This was also Hitchcock’s third talkie film after Blackmail and Juno and the Paycock.   You get a feel of clever moments throughout the movie but you can also get the feeling that the script is dated and the modern movie goer must be in that mindset to enjoy but enjoy it you shall.

Hitchcock Week

Hello readers of this conglomerate of silly and mildly informative.  This week I thought we would enjoy some of that master of the macabre, Alfred Hitchcock.   As always with a known director I shall like to educate you all on some of the more obscure work that was before our time as well as the classics we know and love.   From his earliest work across the pond to the Universal Studios standings we will get to view films that are some of his more controversial to the sublime.   So stay alert, don't panic and above all else suspect everyone!  Toodles!

lalala, total vulnerable in the shower and death is lurking.