Young and Innocent (1937)

Young and Innocent (1937) is an Alfred Hitchcock body on the beach female seeker hero wrongly accused man police procedural murder romance on the run sometime slapstick, sometime farcical, sometime Anglo-silly, Olde Englishe village life never leave the dog behind car in a collapsing mine special effects and tasteless blackface orchestra twitching man circumstantial pursuit and evasion thriller in the mold and style of many of Alfred Hitchcock's very well known pictures, and a minor 1930s classic most renowned for the wonderful but blackface focused crane shot of the decade and starring Nova Pilbeam, Torin Thatcher, Basil Radford, Derrick De Marney as Robert Tisdall lol, Percy Marmont, Edward Rigby, Mary Clare, John Longden as Inspector Kent . . . and George Curzon as "Guy", aka "the guy" I suspect.

Under Capricorn (1949)

We return to that felicitous juncture at which the season consecrated to Joseph Cotten unites itself with the prospective current of Alfred Hitchcock.

 Under Capricorn (1949) is an Alfred Hitchcock brooding moral historical sinister housekeeper and class conflict romance outback ranch nine to ten minute tracking shot paranoid women and gaslighting and past catching up with you alcohol themed antipodean love triangle drama classic color film noir farewell to the forties tale of the masochistic extremes of marital fidelity and a gloomy amalgam of shared guilt abjured desire complete with a drugged drink starring Ingrid Bergman, Jospeh Cotten, Cecil Parker, Michael Wilding, Margaret Leighton (as Milly, Flusky's scheming housekeeper), Denis O'Dea as Mr Corrigan, Jack Watling and Harcourt Williams.

The Trouble With Harry (1955)

The Trouble With Harry (1955) is an Alfred Hitchcock shaggy dog black comedy iconic and laconic absurdist Beckettian farcical narcissistically inclined fantasy romance melodramatic lampoon burlesque send-up Technicolor travesty with John Forsythe, Mildred Natwick, Jerry Mathers, Edmund Gwenn, Shirley MacLaine in her film debut, and Royal Dano, and is one of Hitchcock’s few unequivocal forays into comedy, though it remains consistent with his habitual use of irony and dark, tongue-in-cheek humor while being also notable for its unusually frank dialogue, exemplified by John Forsythe’s unembarrassed declaration of his wish to paint Shirley MacLaine’s character wiff no clothes upon her!

Let me go on, The Trouble With Harry (1955) is not an film noir, nor has much noir adjacent styles themes nor tones, nor noir inflections as they are called, but as a Hitchcock film made in the era, noir abiding, and not a classic of anything much other than perhaps curiosity or absurdism, it is still be included in our global survey of the decade.

Blackmail (1929)

Blackmail (1929) is an Alfred Hitchcock 1920s police procedural attempted rape and murder in self defence classic British film noir hit sound movie production based on a play and brutally blackly comic cinematic late dip towards higher modernism in the form and its technical prowess as it entered the 1930s, and this film which is clear evidence of the Hitchcockian it is also at its height horrific.

Apologies if the film noir canon is to be legally formatted in the 1920s, the thought is not tuned into the key features of the style, so it is unusual to call it a classic, and yet unanimous support from the Film Noir Board in fact classify it, classicify it if you can, that is the verdict.

Murder! (1930)

The nascent works of Alfred Hitchcock, those formative exercises in suspense and moral ambiguity produced in the liminal years between silent expressionism and the codified sound era, persist as spectral presences within the embryonic landscape of what would later crystallize as film noir.

Murder! (1930) is an Alfred Hitchcock death row amnesia proto film noir poetic realist murder melodrama locked room  mystery sleuthing and amateur detection story of touring theatre blackmail and early twentieth century racism and transvestite trapeze performance.

Suspicion (1942)

Suspicion (1942) is an Alfred Hitchcock birth of psychological film noir era foaming seas beneath the cliffs and motor car as lethal weapon gothic romance drama abusive behaviour gaslighting and lousy husband bullying-and-belittling-style paranoid woman film noir classique, and probably a classic film noir, starring Cary Grant as the sarcastic, mysterious, lousy husband from somewhere between farce and vaudeville, Joan Fontaine as his target and constant, and Nigel Bruce as a buddy bumbler comic face pulling foil, and containing the full silver service of Hitchcock mental cruelty, as Joan Fontaine instantly transforms from bookish, educated and independent professional woman into sensual and servile lover and then into quivering gaslit wreck.

Dial M For Murder (1954)

The Ray Milland Season Hitchcock Highlight unfolds without haste —  it drifts — not lost, but unanchored — tracing arabesques through the medium of noir

Dial M For Murder (1954) is an Alfred Hitchcock Technicolor dual-strip polarised 3D but always subsequently seen in 2D lousy husband telephone-noir based-on-a play home invasion murder and police and detective procedural intriguer starring Grace Kelly, Ray Milland, Robert Cummings, Anthony Dawson and John Williams.

The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)

The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) is an Alfred Hitchcock British-period thriller proto-noir proto-Hitchcock proto-innocent person swept up in intrigue psychological and action exciter.

In his contemporary review of The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), Forsyth Hardy noted the absence of expressive use of sound, especially when compared to earlier Hitchcock works like Murder! or Blackmail. However, while the film lacks overt or showy sound techniques, it marks a significant evolution in Hitchcock’s handling of sound. 

Stage Fright (1950)

Stage Fright (1950) is an Alfred Hitchcock British female seeker hero theatre-land murder mystery starring Jane Wyman, Richard Todd, Alistair Sim and wow yes fans, it is Marlene Dietrich.

After the triumphs of his American films, Alfred Hitchcock returned to his roots with Stage Fright (1950), set largely in the theatrical world of post-war London. Based on Selwyn Jepson’s novel Man Running, the project marked Hitchcock’s attempt to merge his fascination with the stage with his penchant for suspense. The screenplay, adapted by his wife Alma and playwright James Bridie, promised a compelling tale of murder, deception, and performance, but the resulting film revealed both creative successes and notable flaws.

Jamaica Inn (1939)

Jamaica Inn (1939) is an Alfred Hitchcock Daphne Du Maurier historical wrecker and robber grog-swilling smuggler undercover cop old dark house family tragedy and at times pleasantly ham-laden melodrama, which also doubles as Alfred Hitchcock's last British film and the last feature film the great director made which did not feature one of his directorial cameos within it.

Alfred Hitchcock’s oeuvre is rife with complex and often tyrannical parental figures. This recurring motif not only shapes his narratives but also deepens the psychological tension in his films. 

Foreign Correspondent (1940)

Foreign Correspondent (1940) is an early American period Alfred Hitchcock wartime journalism and media political adventure anti-Nazi propaganda espionage romance thriller chase and assumed identity movie, not in any sufficiency of the term as film noir, but most importantly a spy noir, and an espionage adventure, made noir almost with the advent of the twentieth century's best known bad types, the Nazis. 

Made in, for and about a morbid and bellicose hiatus period before the United States entered Word War II and when World War II had no name and is referred to as 'a general war', when Germany has invaded Poland but Russia is still in Alliance with Germany and Britain is at war of a sudden, while Holland is Nazified and occupied and makes up most of the set piece glory, most famously some windmill scene and scenery, amounting to some of the best and if not the best windmill film of the century.

Rear Window (1954)

Rear Window (1954) is a classic Alfred Hitchcock suspense and murder mystery voyeur noir film cineaste's dream romantic drama about marriage, and one man's ability to face the prospect, while weirding a large camera at a window, from which he sees people, and yet no person appears to see him.

The dream of murder commences as James Stewart's character photographer Jeff appears to piece together something far too gruesome to be shown on screen, including the hack sawing of a woman's body.

Shadow of a Doubt (1943)

Shadow of a Doubt (1943) is an early film noir era Alfred Hitchcock charming uncle  prototypical mainstreet serial killer psychopath philosophical murder mystery shocker oncle-noir suspense thriller drama, which is a also a classic film noir, and surely indicative of Hitchcock's effect on and contribution to the style.

It is noted in these chaumers that Alfred Hitchcock is a genre unto himself, and there is a lot of truth in that. So distinct becomes his work, from its earliest to its latest, and undoubtedly it is the same, and uses motifs and styles that only he seemed to be able to excel within. 

His to-camera photography is unique in that it never breaks the fourth wall, but looks through the fourth wall to place his target character within the mind of the audience. Compelling.

Lifeboat (1944)

Lifeboat (1944) is an Alfred Hitchcock John Steinbeck wartime drama-of-limited-setting Nazi paranoia romance with occasional noir reminiscent moments and qualities, although largely a stand alone and unique tension and romance drama of amputation and elegance, class-clashes and peril.

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock,  ce filme la the awesome and always enjoyable and atmospheric Lifeboat is a gripping American survival film based on a story by John Steinbeck. Set entirely on a lifeboat adrift in the Atlantic during World War II, the movie explores the complexities of human nature under extreme circumstances.

The film opens with the aftermath of a naval battle: a British ship and a German U-boat have sunk each other. Eight survivors from different backgrounds find themselves crammed into a lifeboat. Among them is Willi, a German U-boat crewman who is pulled aboard. 

The Wrong Man (1956)

The Wrong Man (1956) is a classic Alfred Hitchcock wrongfully accused man film noir movie, starring Henry Fonda as the man accused, and Vera Miles as the wife-at-home who loses her mind in the process.

One of the most moving of all classic film noir, in terms of the dramatic effect, The Wrong Man is a powerful procedural object lesson in legal terror and powerlessness, framing up the wrong guy as only Hitchcock can, and bringing deep and dangerous emotions to the tableau.

The duet of Henry Fonda and Vera Miles is well cast, and both face their demons. Unlike in many a film noir there is no slippery slope within this classic, in the sense of the wrong side of the tracks and one-false-step style noir that the style favours.

Sabotage (1936)

Sabotage (1936) is an Alfred Hitchcock suspense spy and public terror thriller starring Sylvia Sidney, Oskar Homolka, and John Loder.

It is loosely based on Joseph Conrad's 1907 novel The Secret Agent, about a woman who discovers that her husband, the owner of a London movie theatre, is a terrorist agent.

Alfred Hitchcock's pre-American British thriller, known in the United States as A Woman Alone, stands out as one of his finest works. 

Scripted by Charles Bennett and inspired by Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent, the film was retitled to avoid confusion with Hitchcock's earlier work of the same name. While the plotline remains somewhat thin, it's Hitchcock's meticulous attention to detail that makes this thriller truly captivating.

Saboteur (1942)

Saboteur (1942) is an Alfred Hitchcock wrongfully-accused man espionage and propaganda war-time terror and adventure romance thriller, replete with Americana, American landscapes, oddity, comedy, suspense and tropes galore.

A sheer joy of rollicking war time entertainment, Saboteur (1942) refuses to suffer critiques that it is too preachy in deep pro-Protestant American messaging, promoting the great values of its great self, and going too far in its reaching into the pockets of the nation's moral code.

But this is not the case, given that Hitchcock would go on to film the country, re-recreate the country, give the States such direction and place an immortal stamp on the nation's culture and film industry.

Secret Agent (1936)

Secret Agent (1936) is a wacky and serious by turns British historical continental espionage thriller by Alfred Hitchcock, and one able to pull a rather outré punch with its oddity, hilarity, dark subject matter and casual approach to high European super spy-work.

Either way the debonair humour and sophisticated violence and random fantasy involved in this type of fancy spy work is going at some point in the future, and maybe after being re-emphasised by Hitchcock in his masterpiece North By Northwest (1959) be reminiscent of the British Bond, and indeed if you were to ever ask who might have been the first British actor to play such a thing, the answer may well be that it is John Gielgud.

That is correct. Gielgud as Bond. He even does the Mrs Female Spy only one bed for Mr and Mrs Bond in a hotel room routine, so why not.

Spellbound (1945)

Spellbound (1945) is an Alfred Hitchcock romantic psychological amnesia thriller with a noir nuance that cannot be denied. 

In some senses an outlier in the body of Alfred Hitchcock's own work, and not entirely styled in the mode of a more traditional or acceptable example of film noir, Spellbound does carry with it key noir themes of amnesia and psychoanalysis, and is as much a thriller as it is a psychological mystery.

Most of Spellbound's power comes as a romance story — always a strength with Alfred Hitchcock, who was as much a master of amour as he was of suspense.

Spellbound follows a psychoanalyst who falls in love with the new head of the Vermont hospital in which she works, only to find that he is an imposter suffering dissociative amnesia, and potentially, a murderer.

Notorious (1946)

Notorious (1946) by Alfred Hitchcock is an espionage romance story, with film noir overtones.

The picture stars Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman, with support from Claude Rains, and is a favourite among Alfred Hitchcock lovers for its mature cinematic portrayal of a love affair. 

The film noir overtones that characterise Notorious are best illustrated in the dark forces that negatively affect Alicia Huberman (Ingrid Bergman) in the form of alcohol and poison, both of which cause her hallucinations that are shared with the viewers of the film through noir photography, fully developed by this stage in the film noir cycle, as is the theme of the ineffective marriage, which is fully played out between Bergman and Rains.