Alfred Hitchcock Collection

Movie Review – Torn Curtain

February 17, 2020February 11, 2020 Rodney Twelftree

Principal Cast : Paul Newman, Julie Andrews, Lila Kedrova, Hansjorg Felmy, Tamara Toumanova, Wolfgang Kieling, Ludwig Donath, Gunter Strack, David Opatoshu, Gisela Fisher, Mort Mills, Carolyn Conwell, Arthur Gould-Porter, Gloria Gorvin. Synopsis: An American scientist publicly defects to East Germany as part of a cloak and dagger mission to find the solution for a formula resin before planning an escape back to the West. ******** If you were to list all the factors working in Torn Curtain’s favour, you’d be forgiven for thinking the film might be one of Alfred…

Movie Review – Birds, The

May 30, 2019May 11, 2019 Rodney Twelftree

Principal Cast : Tippi Hedren, Rod Taylor, Jessica Tandy, Veronica Cartright, Suzanne Pleshette, Ethel Griffies, Charles McGraw, Lonny Chapman, Doreen Lang, Karl Swenson, Joe Mantell, Ruth McDevitt, Malcolm Atterbury, John McGovern, Richard Deacon, Elizabeth Wilson, Doodles Weaver, William Quinn. Synopsis: A wealthy San Francisco socialite pursues a potential boyfriend to a small Northern California town that slowly takes a turn for the bizarre when birds of all kinds suddenly begin to attack people. ******** I’ve always had a soft spot for Hitchcock’s The Birds, his 1963 masterpiece of animalia terror and…

Movie Review – Rebecca (1940)

November 6, 2017November 1, 2017 Rodney Twelftree

Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1940 Principal Cast : Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier, Judith Anderson, George Sanders, Reginald Denny, Gladys Cooper, C Aubrey Smith, Nigel Bruce, Florence Bates, Edward Fielding, Melville Cooper, Leo G Carroll, Leonard Carey, Lumsden Hare. Approx Running Time : 125 Minutes Synopsis: A self-conscious bride is tormented by the memory of her husband’s dead first wife. ******** Rebecca is notable in almost innumerable ways, not the least it being Alfred Hitchcock’s first film following his move to America, and the first of his two Oscar-nominated…

Movie Review – Foreign Correspondent

May 10, 2017April 13, 2017 Rodney Twelftree

Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1940 Principal Cast : Joel McCrea, Laraine Day, Herbert Marshall, George Sanders, Albert Bassermann, Robert Benchley, Edmund Gwenn, Eduardo Ciannelli, Harry Davenport, Martin Kosleck, Frances Carson, Ian Wolfe, Edward Conrad, Charles Halton, Barbara Pepper. Approx Running Time : 120 Minutes Synopsis: On the eve of World War II, a young American reporter tries to expose enemy agents in London. ****** A hugely entertaining wartime caper, Foreign Correspondent is superbly Hitchcockian in the best of all possible ways. Set on the cusp of World War…

Movie Review – Murder!

October 29, 2015March 15, 2018 Rodney Twelftree

– Summary – Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1930 Principal Cast : Herbert Marshall, Norah Baring, Phyllis Konstam, Edward Chapman, Miles Mander, Esme percy, Donald Calthrop, Esme V Chaplin, Amy Brandon-Thomas, Joynson Powell, SJ Warmington, Marie Wright, Hannah Jones, Una O’Connor, RE Jeffrey. Approx Running Time : 92 Minutes Synopsis: A juror in a murder trial, after voting to convict, has second thoughts and begins to investigate on his own before the execution. ********** Hitchcock’s third “talkie”, made in 1930, is a far cry better than his…

Movie Review – Juno & The Paycock

October 28, 2015September 19, 2015 Rodney Twelftree

– Summary – Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1930 Principal Cast : Barrie Fitzgerald, Marie O’Neill, Edward Chapman, Sidney Morgan, Sara Allgood, John Laurie, Dave Morris, Kathleen O’Regan, John Longden, Dennis Wyndham. Approx Running Time : 96 Minutes Synopsis: During the Irish revolution, a family earns a big inheritance. They start leading a rich life forgetting what the most important values are. ********** The luck of the Irish. Juno & The Paycock is an interesting Hitchcock film in that it represents an early “experimental” project for…

Movie Review – Manxman, The (1929)

October 27, 2015March 15, 2018 Rodney Twelftree

– Summary – Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1929 Principal Cast : Carl Brisson, Malcolm Keen, Anny Ondra, Randle Ayrton, Clare Greet, Kim Peacock. Approx Running Time : 110 Minutes Synopsis: A fisherman and a rising young lawyer, who grew up as brothers, fall in love with the same girl. ********* So that’s where Michael Bay got his story for Pearl Harbor! The Manxman’s debut in 1929 would represent a watershed moment for Hitchcock’s directorial career. It would be his final silent film; his subsequent movie, Blackmail,…

Movie Review – Farmer’s Wife, The (1928)

October 26, 2015August 26, 2015 Rodney Twelftree

– Summary – Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1928 Principal Cast : Jameson Thomas, Lillian Hall-Davis, Gordon Harker, Gibb McLaughlin, Maude Gill, Louie Pounds, Olga Slade, Ruth Maitland, Antonia Brough, Mollie Ellis. Approx Running Time : 129 Minutes Synopsis: After his daughter weds, a middle-aged widower with a profitable farm decides to remarry but finds choosing a suitable mate a problematic process. *********** As close as we get to a Hitchcock romantic comedy? Hmm. The Farmer’s Wife isn’t about the wife of a farmer, so much, it’s…

Movie Review – Sabotage (1936)

October 9, 2015August 31, 2015 Rodney Twelftree

– Summary – Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1936 Principal Cast : Sylvia Sidney, Oskar Homolka, Desmond Tester, John Loder, Joyce Barbour, Matthew Boulton, SJ Warmington, William Dewhurst, Charles Hawtree, Peter Bull. Approx Running Time : 76 Minutes Synopsis: A Scotland Yard undercover detective is on the trail of a saboteur who is part of a plot to set off a bomb in London. But when the detective’s cover is blown, the plot begins to unravel. ********* War on terror. Hitchcock’s Sabotage is a stylish, evocative pre-war…

Movie Review – Easy Virtue (1928)

October 15, 2014March 15, 2018 Rodney Twelftree

– Summary – Director : Alfred Hitchcock Year Of Release : 1928 Principal Cast : Isabel Jeans, Robin Irvine, Franklin Dyall, Eric Bransby Williams, Ian Hunter, Violet Farebrother, Frank Elliot, Dacia Deane, Dorothy Boyd, Enid Stamp Taylor. Approx Running Time : 80 Minutes Synopsis: A divorcée hides her scandalous past from her new husband and his family. What we think : Bland, innocuous romantic drama from Hitch, with a palatable story and character sliding down like fast-food. Hitch’s technical skill seems to have gone missing; the film isn’t as showy…

Category: Alfred Hitchcock Collection