Blackmail (1929)
Country: GB
Technical: bw 78m (also silent version)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Anny Ondra, Sara Allgood, John Longden
Synopsis:
A salesgirl is picked up by an artist who has more than painting in mind. She stabs him in defense of her honour but is observed by another man, who proceeds to blackmail her.
Review:
Hitchcock's first sound film is full of surprises. It is the first in which he muddied the boundaries of guilt and innocence, and indeed many of his themes and devices are here in confident form: the incompetent police force, the humorous personal appearance, the climactic pursuit to a high location culminating in a fall. As in The Lodger, where he exploited the limits of silent cinema with a glass ceiling, he here explores the possibilities of sound with an overlapping scream and the stabbing of the word 'knife' in the breakfast scene.
Country: GB
Technical: bw 78m (also silent version)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Anny Ondra, Sara Allgood, John Longden
Synopsis:
A salesgirl is picked up by an artist who has more than painting in mind. She stabs him in defense of her honour but is observed by another man, who proceeds to blackmail her.
Review:
Hitchcock's first sound film is full of surprises. It is the first in which he muddied the boundaries of guilt and innocence, and indeed many of his themes and devices are here in confident form: the incompetent police force, the humorous personal appearance, the climactic pursuit to a high location culminating in a fall. As in The Lodger, where he exploited the limits of silent cinema with a glass ceiling, he here explores the possibilities of sound with an overlapping scream and the stabbing of the word 'knife' in the breakfast scene.
Country: GB
Technical: bw 78m (also silent version)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Anny Ondra, Sara Allgood, John Longden
Synopsis:
A salesgirl is picked up by an artist who has more than painting in mind. She stabs him in defense of her honour but is observed by another man, who proceeds to blackmail her.
Review:
Hitchcock's first sound film is full of surprises. It is the first in which he muddied the boundaries of guilt and innocence, and indeed many of his themes and devices are here in confident form: the incompetent police force, the humorous personal appearance, the climactic pursuit to a high location culminating in a fall. As in The Lodger, where he exploited the limits of silent cinema with a glass ceiling, he here explores the possibilities of sound with an overlapping scream and the stabbing of the word 'knife' in the breakfast scene.