Classic Films in Focus: STAGE FRIGHT (1950)

Released just before the wildly successful Strangers on a Train (1951), Stage Fright (1950) ranks among the minor entries in the Alfred Hitchcock canon. It lacks the screw tightening suspense of the best of the director's pictures, and its humor, while engaging, never reaches that pitch black, twisted level that fans adore in the most iconic Hitchcock films. That said, Stage Fright offers an assortment of entertaining performances from its cast, especially a collection of delightful character actors in supporting roles. Jane Wyman and Marlene Dietrich carry the lightweight murder plot, such as it is, but the scene stealers here are Alastair Sim, Sybil Thorndike, Kay Walsh, and Joyce Grenfell, each playing the sort of offbeat character you'll remember long after you forget the details of the fuzzy central narrative.

The film opens with aspiring actress Eve Gill (Jane Wyman) trying to help Jonathan Cooper (Richard Todd) escape a murder charge that he claims to have gotten mixed up in on behalf of the seductive stage star Charlotte Inwood (Marlene Dietrich). Charlotte's husband has been killed, with Cooper spotted leaving the scene by Charlotte's maid, Nellie (Kay Walsh). Eve enlists her father, Commodore Gill (Alastair Sim), as a confederate in hiding Cooper from the police, including the charming Detective Smith (Michael Wilding), for whom Eve rapidly develops some very inconvenient feelings. Determined to expose Charlotte as the real killer, Eve disguises herself as a mousy dresser named Doris, but her efforts are complicated by the constant appearance of people who know her as Eve.

Several elements make this movie a less than successful Hitchcock production. The most glaring is the flashback used at the beginning to create a set of expectations for both Eve and the audience. There's something not quite right about it, as later events prove. There's also not much suspense in the way that the action unfolds. Eve's deceptions provide plenty of comedy, but it's more straightforward than perverse, and she never encounters any seriously dangerous situations until the very end of the film. Contrast the pacing and mood here with those in Shadow of a Doubt (1943), for instance, and it's easy to see that Stage Fright wanders a bit and lacks real teeth as a proper thriller. More might be made of the uncertainty the audience feels about Cooper, who exploits Eve's unrequited affection to save his own neck, but Richard Todd's perfectly acceptable performance is overshadowed by the livelier character actors and the very engaging Dietrich, who makes a far more interesting murder suspect as the selfish, glamorous star.

What it lacks in suspense and narrative thrust, Stage Fright makes up for in the little things, and it's still a movie worth seeing if you're a fan of English character actors. Alastair Sim and Sybil Thorndike are delightful as Eve's eccentric, estranged parents, with Sim getting an especially juicy role. The scene in which Cooper asks to spend the night at Eve's home gives the pair a great scene together; watch their expressions and body language as they discuss where everyone is going to sleep. Kay Walsh is pricklier but no less engaging as the scheming dresser, Nellie, who lets Eve bribe her and then demands blackmail money to continue their ruse. She and Sim get big laughs when he brings the required funds to the garden party but fails to recognize their intended recipient. Joyce Grenfell, billed in the credits as "Lovely Ducks," has only one scene, but it's a corker, a sublime example of feminine physical comedy. Just watch how she fumbles and chatters her way through an attempt to load the Commodore's gun. Speaking of characters with limited scenes, be sure to note the director's daughter, Patricia Hitchcock, as Chubby Bannister, one of Eve's friends from the drama school.

With its English setting and characters, Stage Fright hearkens back to the films Hitchcock made before his move to Hollywood. Try The 39 Steps (1935) and The Lady Vanishes (1938) for a sense of that phase of the director's career. Jane Wyman won the Oscar for Best Actress for Johnny Belinda (1948); you'll also find her in The Yearling (1946), The Glass Menagerie (1950), and Magnificent Obsession (1954). Marlene Dietrich's other films from the 1950s include Rancho Notorious (1952), Witness for the Prosecution (1957), and Touch of Evil (1958). Catch Michael Wilding in Torch Song (1953), and see Richard Todd take a more saintly turn in A Man Called Peter (1955). Although he appeared in more than fifty films, including Green for Danger (1947), An Inspector Calls (1954), and School for Scoundrels (1960), Alastair Sim is best remembered today for his performance as Ebenezer Scrooge in the 1951 adaptation of A Christmas Carol.

Classic Films in Focus: STRANGERS ON A TRAIN (1951)

Strangers on a Train (1951) brought Alfred Hitchcock back to box office success after the lull that followed Notorious (1946), and today it remains a favorite with the auteur's fans. Hitchcock presents a deliciously twisted thriller in this tale of murder and blackmail, with Farley Granger returning after his performance in Rope (1948) for a second outing with the director, but it's the creepy appeal of Robert Walker that makes Strangers on a Train such a macabre delight. There's nary a blonde in sight, but Ruth Roman, Laura Elliott, and Hitchcock's daughter, Patricia, all give memorable performances as the younger women, while Marion Lorne and Norma Varden provide some delightful comic relief in their smaller roles.

Granger plays tennis star Guy Haines, who meets a fan named Bruno Antony (Robert Walker) while on a train. Bruno knows all about Guy and his personal problems, especially that Guy can't be with his new love, Anne (Ruth Roman), until his wife (Laura Elliott, aka Kasey Rogers) gives him a divorce. Bruno proposes to kill Guy's wife while Guy kills Bruno's hated father, but Guy doesn't take him seriously until it's too late. When Guy refuses to commit Bruno's murder in return, Bruno sets out to frame Guy for his wife's death, forcing Guy to dodge the police and resort to drastic measures.

Like a lot of Hitchcock's protagonists, Granger's Guy quickly finds himself deep in a situation beyond his control, and the stress pushes him outside the comfortable norms of polite behavior. He becomes secretive, driven, and tense, but we get hints of his inherent darkness early on, when he argues with his faithless wife and then tells his girlfriend that he could strangle the uncooperative woman. Guy never seems especially upset that his wife is dead, just unhappy that he's the most obvious suspect. Granger is solid in the role, but the real star of the picture is Walker, whose talkative, unstable Bruno drives the action throughout. He's a weirdly likable killer, devoted to his mother and rather desperate for Guy's approval, and he's shaken enough by the act of murder to develop a kind of PTSD in response to it. Bruno's scenes with his mother and Mrs. Cunningham, played by Marion Lorne and Norma Varden respectively, show his ability to endear himself to older women through his "naughty" sense of mischief; in some ways he's the opposite of Joseph Cotten's homicidal Uncle Charlie in Shadow of a Doubt (1942). The role ought to have been a comeback moment for Walker, who had struggled with alcoholism after being left by his wife, Jennifer Jones, but the actor died tragically just months after finishing the film.

Hitchcock engages in his usual visual tricks to crank up the suspense, and the amusement park setting of the murder gives him with plenty of striking images to use. Bruno pursues Miriam Haines through the Tunnel of Love in a boat named for Pluto, the god of the underworld; she constantly looks back at him as she romps through the carnival, never recognizing her seeming admirer as a figure of Death. We see Miriam strangled in the reflection of her own glasses, and afterward the glasses worn by Barbara (Patricia Hitchcock) cause Bruno to relive the murder, complete with echoing carnival music and a spinning sense of vertigo. A thoughtful viewer might pause a moment to wonder why Hitchcock would cast his own daughter as someone the antagonist wants to strangle every time he sees her, but the scenes are certainly provocative. The director also has fun with the tennis matches, where the spectators watch the back-and-forth between the players just as we watch the deadlier match being played by Bruno and Guy. The climax, back at the amusement park, delivers a hair-raising finale on a runaway carousel, as well as a wonderfully vicious little scene in which Bruno loses the cigarette lighter that he needs to frame Guy.

Strangers on a Train picked up only one Oscar nod, for Best Cinematography, but it's certainly a picture every Hitchcock fan should see. The director followed this film with I Confess (1953), Dial M for Murder (1954), and Rear Window (1954). You can see more of Robert Walker in Since You Went Away (1944), Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944), and The Clock (1945), while Farley Granger has memorable roles in They Live by Night (1948), Side Street (1949), and Senso (1954). Look for Ruth Roman in The Window (1949) and The Far Country (1954). Patricia Hitchcock, who is still living at this time, appears in two other Hitchcock films, Stage Fright (1950) and Psycho (1960), and she acted in numerous episodes of the Alfred Hitchcock Presents TV series.

PS - If you want to know more about Robert Walker, you can read a thorough discussion of his life and career at The Lady Eve's Reel Life.