Rebecca (1940)

I love this movie. Joan Fontaine plays the second Mrs. de Winter, never given a first name in either the book by Daphne Du Maurier or the movie. While working as a companion to an elderly rich woman, the second Mrs. de Winter meets Mr. de Winter at a resort in Monte Carlo. He is moody and mysterious from the moment she meets him, an encounter during which he appears to be about to jump off of a cliff. She is completely unsure of what to make of him or if he even likes her. She is taken by surprise when he proposes marriage to her rather than lose her, when her companion packs up to sail off to New York.

When the second Mrs. de Winter arrives at the luxurious Manderley with her new husband, we find out why it is that she has no name of her own. She is living in the shadow of the first Mrs. de Winter... Rebecca. She is also at the whim of the creepy Mrs. Danvers, who came to Manderley with Rebecca and has remained devoted to her even after her assumed death in a boating accident. Mrs. Danvers is not so happy to see a new Mrs. de Winter taking Rebecca's place. And Mr. de Winter is too moody and busy to notice what is happening to his new wife. Or does he regret having married her at all?

Really the only thing that annoys me in Rebecca is the way Mr. de Winter treats his new wife from the moment he meets her. I know he is supposed to be a damaged, grief-stricken man, but being damaged and grief-stricken are more handy for explaining away intense moodiness than for explaining away why he thinks his new bride is a little child.

(1)"I'm not hungry."

"Eat up like a good little girl."

(2)He hides her tennis racket behind a plant after declaring they should go for a drive.

(3)"Stop biting your nails."

(4)"I'm asking you to marry me you little fool!"

But the future Mrs. deWinter does not seem to mind any of this. It seems to be what she expects. It is only the intense moodiness that seems to get her down. I suppose I should just be happy to be a young woman in the 21st century. Three stars, and I want Joan Fontaine's wardrobe from the movie. I would definitely see this again someday. It also makes me want to reread the book.

To Catch a Thief (1955)

Every once in a while it's nice just to watch a movie I already know I like. Enter To Catch a Thief, a Hitchcock film with great acting, great dialogue, and fascinating wardrobe choices. And of course Cary Grant is Cary Grant, looking suave even in a crazy red with white polka dots silk scarf wrapped around his neck.

But of course he is suave, not only is he Cary Grant, he is playing John Robie, a former jewel thief turned hero of the French resistance. Robie comes under suspicion after a string of jewel thefts, all bearing his famous mark. With the police on his tail, he escapes by boat to Cannes, where he makes his first costume change. And yes, he continues to look suave floating to shore in his new plaid bathing trunks.

A worried jewelry insurance agent convinces Robie to try to clear his own name by catching the copycat burglar. Robie is equipped with a list of the insured and any personal details that could help him to keep a good watch on then, prompting the well delivered, "I wish I'd known someone in the insurance racket when I went into the burglary business." Robie quickly settles into the Ritz Carlton Hotel under a fake name in order to befriend and keep an eye on the heavily jeweled Jessie Stevens. And there he meets her daughter Frances, played by Grace Kelly. Grace Kelly's dresses are honestly reason enough to watch this movie. Leaving aside whether or not I could pull any of them off, I want them. Especially this one:

In fact, the only outfit of hers in which I have no interest is the "bathing costume" below:

Robie is not put off by the bathing costume, though. What puts him off about Frances Stevens is when she reveals that not only does she know he's really Robie "the cat," but she believes he is in fact guilty of the current crime spree and... wants to join him. Robie just isn't interested in "women who need weird excitement."

Cary Grant climbing around on rooftops, Grace Kelly's dresses, a Hitchcock mystery to solve...I love this movie.

One more great line I couldn't work in above...

Jesse about her daughter Frances: "Sorry I ever sent her to that finishing school. I think they finished her there." Four stars, and I will definitely watch this again.

Notorious (1946)

I have watched and re-watched so many Hitchcock movies, and it just occurred to me that I have never once spotted Hitchcock doing one of his cameos, aside from after the movie if there's a DVD feature that shows it to me. I'm going to choose to believe that this is because I am so involved in the plots of the movies and not that I am completely unobservant. Anyways, I've been meaning to see this one since "Suspicion," because I had parts of the plots confused.

Notorious: Ingrid Bergman plays Alicia, the daughter of a Nazi spy who killed himself in prison. Cary Grant plays an American agent, Devlin, who recruits Alicia to spy on her father's former friends. He brings her to Rio de Janeiro, where she is expected to infiltrate a group of German scientists. When Alicia and Devlin first arrive in Rio, they don't know the full details of Alicia's assignment. As they wait for their orders, Alicia falls in love with Devlin, and Devlin does his best to pretend that he has not fallen for her. Devlin finally receives word that the assignment calls for Alicia to seduce a former friend of her father's who was once in love with her, Alexander Sebastian ("...Claude Rains was the invisible man..."!). He is horrified and tries but fails to tell the other American agents that it is not a job Alicia should be made to do. He returns to Alicia's apartment (where she has been preparing a lovely romantic dinner for him), and tells her the assignment. Alica is just as horrified as Devlin and is upset by the seemingly emotionless way in which Devlin tells her about it. All she wants is for Devlin to admit that he loves her and does not want her to take the assignment. Devlin is unable to do this and doesn't even tell her that he tried to get her out of it. This all leads to Alicia's wonderfully delivered line, "Oh, we shouldn't have had this out here. It's all cold now." Alicia is reintroduced to Sebastian, very quickly marries him, and begins to feed Devlin information about the scientists who meet frequently at the house. Unfortunately for Alicia, Sebastian discovers her treachery, putting her into even greater danger. I will not give the ending away. Just know that Cary Grant is wonderful.



I realized that while I watch Cary Grant movies, I am always evaluating which Cary Grant characters I would run away with. Devlin, I think, is not quite right for me. It would be too tortured what with neither of us giving away our feelings. I remain most likely to run off with Johnny Case from "Holiday." Four stars for this movie... I am sure I will see it again someday. Time to see "Holiday" again!

Saboteur (1942)

Three stars. I would probably watch it again some day.

At the beginning of the movie Barry (Robert Cummings) is working in an aircraft factory. Suddenly a fire starts in one of the hangers. When Barry and his friend rush over to help, the mysterious Mr. Fry (Norman Lloyd), hands them a fire extinguisher. Barry's friend enters the hanger and is blown up. Within a few hours, Barry is suspected of sabotage. It turns out that that fire extinguisher handed to him by Fry, that Barry then handed to his friend, was full of gasoline. Barry runs from the police to try to find Fry and clear his own name. Eventually, after a wonderful scene involving a horse chase (yay, a horse chase!), Barry takes refuge in the cabin of a wise blind man. Being a wise blind man, the man can of course hear that Barry is wearing handcuffs, knows Barry is wanted as a dangerous saboteur, but also is able to sense that Barry must be a good-hearted man who has been wrongly accused. The wise blind man tells his niece Pat (Priscilla Lane of Arsenic and Old Lace) to take Barry to the blacksmith to have his handcuffs removed. Pat is not quite convinced of Barry's innocence and tries to take him to the police station, and Barry is forced to abduct her and drag her along with him as he continues to run from the law.



It is worth watching this movie because:

*You get to see Hitchcock's art.
*Barry and Pat spend part of a night riding in a train caboose with some kindly (and some grumpy) circus performers. The bearded lady is very sweet, of course.
*Pat writes a "Help Me!" note in lipstick and throws it out the window of a skyscraper.
*There is an exciting chase and much drama inside and hanging from the torch of the Statue of Liberty.



This must have been a scary movie when it came out in 1942, what with the American citizens colluding with Nazis and committing horrifying acts of sabotage.

Suspicion (1941)

Smarmy Cary Grant character... or is he? While watching this, I was trying to think of other smarmy Cary Grant characters. I think that lately I've been watching a lot of the "I would run off with that Cary Grant character" movies, so I'm having trouble remembering other smarmy ones. Anyways, this is not a Cary Grant character I'm planning on running off with. Lina (Joan Fontaine) feels differently, though. She meets and marries Johnnie (Grant) pretty quickly, only to discover that he is completely broke and hasn't worked a day in his life. He's too busy gambling and spending the money he does not have. But he's Johnnie, handsome and lovable, so Lina believes she can change him... until she starts to suspect him of murder.



I think it's worth watching this movie for the shadows. Sometimes when Lina steps into the front hall of her house she looks like she is in a cage. Here's Johnnie coming up the stairs with his mysterious glass of milk for Lina. See the shadows?



What you can't really tell from the picture is that the glass of milk is glowing from within just to show us how suspicious it is. Would you trust Johnnie? Lina doesn't...



She makes Johnnie sleep in his dressing room and leaves the milk on her night stand.

I think I'm giving this movie three stars. I'm sure I'll watch it again someday. Right now it's making me want to watch "Notorious," though.

The Lady Vanishes (1938)

I wanted to see this movie for a long time, mostly because it's referenced in "When Harry Met Sally." When Sally spots Harry in a bookstore and says she won't say hi because he never remembers her anyways, Carrie Fisher's character tells her that she's probably destined to fall in love with him, it's just like the movie..."you're the most contemptible man..." So I saw it and promptly forgot all about it. This doesn't mean it is not a great movie, though! I just rewatched it, and it definitely deserves four stars.



This movie is great Hitchcock. There are trains, there is intrigue... Iris (Margaret Lockwood) is traveling home to England to be married, and she's not terribly happy about it. While in the hotel by the train station she meets a number of the other passengers who are about to be on her train. There's the couple having the affair and the dopey guys who are obsessed with cricket. And most significantly, there's the charmingly sarcastic musician Gilbert (Michael Redgrave) who threatens to share her room with her -scandal!- when she has him thrown out of his room for playing his music and dancing too loudly. And of course there's the sweet old governess Miss Froy. Iris is mysteriously knocked out by a flower pot before getting on the train, and Miss Froy stays with her and helps her. After spending part of the day with Miss Froy on the train, Iris wakes up to find that not only is Miss Froy gone, but that most of the other passengers deny every having seen her and claim that Iris has been alone the whole time. Gilbert is the only one willing to help her... and the intrigue begins...

The love story between Iris and Gilbert's characters can be summed up with three quotes:

1) When they meet: "You are the most contemptible person I've every met in my life." her
"Confidentially, you're a bit of a stinker, too." him

2) After having spent a number of intense hours together trying to solve the mystery of the missing Miss Froy:
"Do you like me?" him
"Not much." her

3) When things are going the most swimmingly: "You heartless, caddish, swollen-headed beast..." her, of course as she is kissing him

So I love the mystery, and it was probably good that I didn't remember the plot, because that allowed me to enjoy the mystery all over again. The movie also made me think a lot about why I love stories where the characters hate each other before they fall in love. Do we all love these stories? Someone else must, or there wouldn't be so many of them...

Spellbound (1945)

Four stars for the movie and 13 stars for Gregory Peck's face in this movie



I think that this is a great mystery, and I do not want to give away anything that would ruin the suspense, so I'm not going to give very much of a plot summary. When the movie begins, Dr. Constance Petersen (Ingrid Bergman) is a psychoanalyst at Green Manor. We first meet her while she's working with a patient who declares, "I hate men! I loathe them! If one of them so much as touches me, I want to sink my teeth into his hand and bite him!" Be ready for more quotes, because I loved the dialogue in this movie!

Dr. Petersen is a calm and brilliant thinker, but her smarmy colleague tells her that her "lack of human and emotional experience" is bad for her as a doctor. Touching her is "rather like embracing a textbook...[although she's] a sweet, adorable, and pulsing woman underneath." This all changes, though, when Gregory Peck's character arrives to take over as the new head of the facility, and of course Dr. Petersen falls in love...



I loved the movie, but it definitely had some interesting things to say about women (even beyond the above quotes!):
"The poor girl's withering away for science."
"Do not complete the sentence with the usual female contradictions."
"woman doublespeak"...
"We both know that a woman in love is operating on the lowest level of intellect."

I can forgive the above for the exciting plot and Gregory Peck's face. Also for...
Tips and Lessons learned:
*Next time an unwanted guy gets too close: "Would you mind not sitting in my lap?"
*Next time a friend is catastrophizing or I need to talk myself out of catastrophizing: "That's a delusion you've acquired out of illness."
*Next time I am trying to figure anything out: Remember every detail of my dreams, even if they are not Salvador Dali dream sequences like the one in the movie.
*Next time I am trying to hide from someone: Put on my glasses! Dr. Petersen is able to hide just like Clark Kent!
*Next time I am tempted to fall in love with my psychoanalyst: Do not! It gets messy!

And I must mention that 1945 Gregory Peck and I would be perfect for each other. When Dr. Petersen tells him where she's hoping to put a pool on the Green Manor grounds, he very seriously tells her, "I'm a great believer in swimming pools." I love swimming pools.

And because I love quotes, just a few more:

"There's nothing nicer than a new marriage. No psychosis yet... I wish you to have babies and not phobias."

"Will you love me just as much when I'm normal?"
"Oh, I'll be insane about you!"