-exhibition to introduce
Sunday’s Penicuik screening of The 39 Steps:
THE FILMS
OF
ALFRED
HITCHCOCK
HITCHCOCK pictured by Penicuik
Great photographer ALBERT WATSON
SUNDAY’S FILM
SUNDAY 29 JUNE: PENICUIK CINEMA in the TOWN HALL
ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S CLASSIC
SUNDAY 29 JUNE: PENICUIK CINEMA in the TOWN HALL
ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S CLASSIC
HITCHCOCK’S THE 39 STEPS doors open 7 for
-A PENICUIK OPEN HOUSE DISPLAY
Cowan Institute (
Virginia Valli in The
(“Irrgarten der Leidenschaft”
Germany-UK silent 1925 b/w)
Director Alfred
Hitchcock for Emelka & Gainsborough, filmed at Emelka Studios in
Hitch part-directs this co-production romantic
melodrama. The
Ivor Novello
in The
Lodger
-A Story of the
(UK silent 1927
b/w) Director Alfred Hitchcock, Producer Michael Balcon
for Picadilly.
Hitch told François Truffaut that though he’d made films earlier, this was his
true first effort. Novello’s star vehicle is based on
a book on the Jack the Ripper killings identifying a lodger as the murderer.
Hitch wanted an ambiguous ending, but the studio wanted Novello
to emerge innocent. Film includes an
inventive “glass ceiling” sequence.
Hitch’s cameo: a desk in the newsroom early in the film; possibly also
later in the crowd lynch scene.
Carl Brisson,
Lilian-Hall Davis & Ian Hunter in The
Ring
(UK silent 1927
b/w) Director Alfred Hitchcock, Producer John Maxwell for British International
Pictures.
"The
Ring" is for some Hitchcock's best silent film; it’s a sharp little
romance that sprints alongwith typical Hitch touches
- the camera gets "knocked out" in a boxing scene –comedy amid the
tragedy -the way he shows crowds at the
fair -the ambivalent attraction of the
girl to both men -the symbolism as the
wife moving from one corner of the ring to the other as the fight progresses -the position of characters in a scene -the edit as the wedding ring is placed on
her finger -the title ambiguities of
boxing ring and wedding ring. All used
with happy abandon by Hitch and clearly showing his early genius.
Ivor Novello
in Downhill
(UK silent 1927 b/w) Director Alfred
Hitchcock, Producer Michael Balcon for Gainsborough
Pictures.
A
tale of two schoolboys who made a pact of loyalty.
One of them keeps his side of the bargain – but at a price. Wrongly accused of
fathering a waitress’s baby, he is first expelled from school and then banished
by his stern father, becoming a continental gigolo. Hitchcock inventively depicts his pitiful
descent into squalor as a social and moral outcast. The star, Ivor Novello, co-wrote the story
and had already appeared in the stage play. But at 35 he was simply too old for
the part.
Isabel Jeans in Easy Virtue
(UK silent 1928
b/w) Director Alfred Hitchcock, Producer Michael Balcon
for Gainsborough Pictures. Larita Filton is named as correspondent in a scandalous divorce
case. First
line:- Prosecutor: “Mrs. Filton
do you wish the Jury to believe the co-respondent never kissed you?”. Last line:- Larita Filton:
[to news photographers] “Shoot! There's nothing left to kill.” Hitch’s cameo: a man with a stick near the
tennis court.
Lilian-Hall Davis in The Farmer’s Wife
(UK silent 1928 b/w) Director Alfred Hitchcock for British International Pictures.
Charming
rustic semi-romantic comedy. Hitch applies tender creativity and the attention
to detail that he would later give to his suspense films, making a simple plot
into a perceptive and touching movie. Characters' feelings and thoughts are
communicated through masterful camera work. The most powerful recurring image
is a pair of chairs near the fireplace, where Farmer Sweetland
remembers his dear departed wife.
Betty Balfour in
(UK silent 1928
b/w) Director Alfred Hitchcock, Producer John Maxwell for British International
Pictures.
A spoilt rich girl leads a
life of luxury. When stocks crash she is forced to fend for herself!
Carl Brisson & Anny
Ondra in The Manxman with Malcolm Keen
(UK silent 1929
b/w) Director Alfred Hitchcock for British International
Pictures. Like The Ring this is a love triangle between a
man, his wife and best friend, and the same lead, Carl Bresson.
This is harsher, prefiguring film noir in disregard for characters' fates.
Hitch puts the audience inside the scenario by making the film almost entirely
point-of-view shots. Time and again Carl Bresson's
big innocent face stares out, implicating us in the guilt of the other two
leads. Very beautiful to look at, with exquisite location shots and great use
of natural lighting, in ironic counterpoint to the darkness of the story, The
Manxman is shot straightforwardly without expressionist camera techniques, and a smooth, flowing style uncluttered with too
many title cards.
Anny Ondra,
John Longden, Donald Calthrop in Blackmail
(
Hitch’s first sound film is typically inventive and
forces the audience to explore the guilty ambiguities of each main
character. The word Knife sounds
insistently above the conversation in the hearing of victim-culprit Annie Ondra. And Hitch sets a familiar national monument as
thriller background (here the suitably silent reading room of the British
Museum, later films the Forth Bridge, Westminster Cathedral, the Statue of
Liberty, Lincoln Memorial, Golden Gate Bridge and Mount Rushmore).
Sean O’Casey’s
Juno and the Paycock
(
Set during the Irish Civil War in the early 1920s
this adaptation of the popular stage play is by Alma Reville,
Mrs Alfred Hitchcock and shows the hardships of a poor Dublin family, They hear
they have come into a big inheritance and start to lead a rich and carefree life forgetting what
the most important values are. By the
time they discover they will not receive the inheritance; the family is
destroyed and penniless. They must sell their home and start living like
vagabonds. Question: Was long-suffering Juno
an original for Dudley Watkins’ Ma Broon?
Herbert Marshall and Norah Baring in Murder
(
Police find the actress,
Diana Baring, near the body of her friend. All evidence seems to point to her
and at the end of a trial, she is condemned. Sir John Menier,
an actor member of the jury, suspects Diana's boyfriend, who works as an
acrobat wearing a dress. Sir John sets out to find the
real murderer before Diana's death sentence is carried out. This is the first film where someone's thoughts are presented
on the soundtrack. Cameo: about an hour into
the movie Hitch walks past the house where the murder was committed.
Helen Haye and
Edmund Gwenn in The Skin Game
(
Pushy social climber Hornblower (Edmund Gwenn) buys
land next to their estate from the aristocratic Hillcrist
family, and promises the tenant family on the land can live there in
perpetuity. Hornblower goes back on his word and
evicts them. When the Hillcrists find their estate
totally surrounded by the upstart Hornblower, Mrs. Hillcrist (Helen Haye) threatens
salacious details of the Hornblower girls past life
known unless the land is returned and tragedy results. Adapted
from the stage and with some good moments, but far from Hitch’s best.
Henry
Kendall and Joan Barry in Rich and Strange
(
Hitch's favourite British
film was a box-office failure. Bravely leaving wordy mainstream adaptations and
the thriller genre behind, this is a visual essay on the disintegration of a
marriage. A suburban couple’s cruise shows how worthless riches can be (vacuous
lives need more than money to fill them) and the last reel is a commentary on the
absurd.
John
Stuart and Leo M. Lion in
Number Seventeen
(
This robbers-on-the-run flick was Hitch's last work
as a director for BIP. He’d wanted to
direct a prestige production of John Van Druten's
play "
Esmond
Knight, Jessie Matthews, Fay Compton and Edmund
Gwenn in
Waltzes from
(UK musical 1934 b/w) Director Alfred
Hitchcock, producer Michael Balcon for Gaumont British (Fr ver: Le Chant
du
In 1933 Hitch found himself
without a picture to direct and signed on for this unlikely musical just to
keep himself working. It was his first effort back
with his old friend Balcon at Gaumont
British – and the film he liked least – "the lowest ebb of my
career". Picture and sound quality were a big improvement, and the story,
though limited, was pleasant enough. Edmund Gwenn's vain and
bitter Strauss Senior adds welcome darkness to the proceedings, but the most
memorable thing is the infamous scene where Strauss Jr
composes The Blue
Nova
Pilbeam, Peter Lorre, Leslie Banks, Edna Best in
The Man Who Knew Too Much
(
Lorre is here one of Hitch's great
villains, like Rains in Notorious, Cotton in Shadow of a Doubt, Walker in
Strangers on a Train or Mason in North by Northwest. Hitchcock always explores
the villain’s perspective even if only briefly as in Tearle’s
“You must consider my point of view” in The 39 Steps or Burr’s “What do you
want?” in Rear Window. This Man Who Knew Too Much has
the advantage of brilliant German-style cinematography and Lorre’s
presence was - the possibility of good sales in German language version.
Robert
Donat and
Madeleine Carroll in The
39 Steps
(
With all the classic elements of the master, 39
Steps sets the standard for later Hitchcock films. There’s Hitch’s classic
theme of an average, innocent man caught up in extraordinary events beyond his
control. And trust is another: between the crofter and his wife, the innkeeper
and his wife, Hannay and Pamela. These motifs drive
the film’s great story, pace, interesting and likeable characters, and sly
wit. It’s sharp, quintessential
Hitchcock.
Madeleine
Carroll, Peter Lorre, John
Geilgud and
Robert Young in
The Secret Agent
Hitch convinced Gielgud to play the lead, describing the hero as a modern
Hamlet. But Gielgud ended up hating his character’s
enigma and felt Hitch made the villain more charming than the hero. Hitch
reflected on Gielgud: "You can't root for a hero
who doesn't want to be one." Cameo: Hitch comes down the ship's gangway.
Sylvia
Sidney
and Oscar Homolka in
Sabotage
(
Verloc, a cinema owner, is one of
a gang of saboteurs in London,and
lives with his wife Sylvia and her young brother Stevie
who know nothing of this. Scotland Yard places an undercover detective next
door to investigate. The gang’s leader assigns Verloc
to put a bomb in the Underground and sends the innocent Stevie
with the bag. What will be the outcome? This disturbing film was banned in
Nova
Pilbeam & Derrick de Marney
in
Young & Innocent
(
This breathlessly paced movie offers gripping
suspense and melodrama as the hero tries to clear his name. The title
deliberately reminds us of the young and innocent victim of the previous film,
making audiences fear what Hitch will do here to his 18 year old star, Nova Pillbeam. Lots of Hitchcock tricks, and his amazing
virtuoso extended zoom reveals all at the end.
Margaret
Lockwood, Michael Redgrave & Dame May Whitty in
The Lady Vanishes
(
Many see this as Hitch’s best early work. It shows
his growing talent for building suspense from an unlikely mix of the
commonplace and the incredible. Post-Munich times were just right for nervous
laughter and Hitch builds up his tension on a delicious foundation of slow
burning comedy.
Charles
Laughton, Robert
(
Reportedly one of Hitch's most unhappy directing
jobs; caught between Charles Laughton and Laughton's business partners, Hitch said he did not so much
direct the film as referee it. He made no cameo appearance and it was the last
film he made in
Laurence
Olivier & Joan Fontaine in
Rebecca
(
Hitch’s
first effort in US gained Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best
Cinematography. Brilliantly directed,
acted and photographed in deep focus (as later used in Citizen Kane) to create
a memorable atmosphere of brooding menace.
Joel McCrea,
Laraine Day, Herbert Marshall in Foreign Correspondent
(
Suspense is unrelenting,
and builds to a spectacular climax with many dazzling Hitchcock sequences: the
assassination in
Carole Lombard &
Robert Montgomery in Mr & Mrs Smith
(
As a favour Carole
Lombard asked Hitch to direct one of her comedy films. Wanting to work with
her, he agreed. Screwball comedy, but far
from Hitch’s best.
Cary Grant & Joan Fontaine in Suspicion
(
A
shy young Englishwoman marries a charming husband and begins to suspect him of
trying to kill her. In the scene where Johnnie brings a glass of milk up to Lina, Alfred Hitchcock had a light hidden in the glass to
make it appear more sinister Despite Hitch's efforts to stick to the original
tragic ending, neither preview audiences nor the RKO studio were ready to
accept Cary Grant as a murderer. So a hasty ending was put in, spoiling the
craft (like the suspicious glass of milk) that led up to that point. Fontaine
got an Oscar for best actress and Grant tries to make the amateurish dialogue
in the final scene work. Cameo: Hitch mails a letter at the post office.
(
Fast
paced chase of wrongly-accused man across
Teresa Wright & Joseph Cotton in Shadow of a Doubt
(
Said to be Hitchcock’s
favourite film - “putting murder back where it belongs, in the home”- this is a
careful evocation of small town life (in
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