193. Notorious (1946)

Running Time: 101 minutes
Directed By: Alfred Hitchcock
Written By: Ben Hecht
Main Cast: Ingrid Bergman, Cary Grant, Claude Rains, Leopoldine Konstantin

HITCHCOCKTOBER FEST!: PART III

I recorded this off of Turner Classic Movies back in January of this year, when Netflix didn't have the DVD available. It was part of TCM's "The Essentials" program, but really I would never call "Notorious" an essential, not even an essential Hitchcock film.

The plot revolves around Alicia Huberman (Bergman), who's father has just been sentenced to twenty years in prison after being convicted of being a Nazi spy. Alicia, however, does not share her father's political views and in a conversation with him, tells him that she is proud to be an American. This particular conversation was recorded by the government and used by U.S. Agent Devlin (Grant) to try and convince Alicia to help them infiltrate a group of Germans who have set up seemingly criminal practices in Brazil. The plan is that since Alicia is the daughter of a known and convicted German sympathizer, the Germans in Brazil will not suspect a thing and naturally assume that she too is a German sympathizer. It also turns out that Alicia knows the head man in Brazil, Alex Sebastian (Rains), so arranging a meeting isn't that difficult. Prior to the official business though, Alicia and Devlin fall in love, in what seems like seconds and when Alicia is forced to get very close to Sebastian, Devlin can't help but feel jealous.

Let's get the good stuff out of the way first, because there's far less good than bad, in my opinion. First of all, I love how Hitchcock used his camera and all of the tricks he liked to do. Much like "Spellbound", where he also used a few glory shots, "Notorious" is full of them: Alicia's POV after a hangover and a very blurry and swirling Cary Grant, the view from the rear view mirror of an approaching cop, the use of shadows, after Alicia is poisoned and all she can see is her poisoners silhouettes. So many great, mesmerizing shots, that seem to make me "oooh" and "aaah". I thought the acting was pretty good here too, but after seeing two of her films, cannot say that I am much of an Ingrid Bergman fan, as she is someone who I had heard a great deal about and someone who, despite being good, certainly hasn't shown me anything great. Cary Grant didn't annoy me too much this time around and I think he's becoming that guy that you don't like, but who keeps showing up and you just decide to go ahead and like him, because there's obviously no shaking him. Best actor of the film honors have to go to Claude Rains though, as I thought he was superb as Alex Sebastian and kind of creeped you out, while at the same time charming the pants off of you.

Now, on to the bad...

I hated how fast the relationship between Devlin and Alicia was established in this movie, although that seemed to be the norm. in the old days. However, it was something that was blatantly obvious here. At one moment the two characters are just acquaintances, and then all of a sudden, they're making out and "in love". It really took away from the film for me, and maybe that's just me being silly, but that's really what I thought. I think there could've been one more scene to really drive home the fact that these two fell in love in such a short amount of time. Even if it had just been a dinner scene, where they share a bit of dialogue and swoon over each other, I mean give me something. Also, the plot just bored me and really didn't seem to get kicked into overdrive until the whole business with the key and the wine cellar. That's the point when Hitchcock really cranked his suspense dial and gave us some real nail biting stuff, and really he kind of owed it to us, after making us dredge through that first hour, which was just really dry, slow and boring.

I can't recommend this film, in good conscience, but honestly though I think Hitchcock is just one of those filmmaker's where everyone has their favorites, and everyone's favorites are different. If you talk to a movie fan, who's seen a lot of Hitchcock, chances are their favorite and your favorite aren't the same. So by all means see it, and I really think there is a large group who will really love this movie, but for me...it is not.

RATING: 4/10 That's just about as high as I could go, and even that may be a tad generous, as this was certainly the worst of the Hitchcock movies from the book, so far. Next up is "Rope".

MOVIES WATCHED: 160
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 841

October 11, 2010 3:26am