by Laura Lai/Review
This film review was my final assignment for the course ‘Academic and Business Writing’ (University of California, Berkeley) provided by edX on its educational platform. It’s with great pleasure that I did my final assignment by watching the movie and reading the book that inspired it. It’s with this course that I deepened my writing technique to review movies. And, now, it’s time to keep on practicing this writing genre. Therefore, with the movie, The 39 Steps starts a series of Alfred Hitchcock’s movies that I’ll review in this Writing Blog. You’re all welcome to read them, comment, and watch the movies! J
Film’s Title: The 39 Steps (1935)
Lead Actors: Robert Donat (Richard Hannay) and
Madeleine Carroll (Pamela)
Other Actors: Lucie Mannheim (Annabella Smith),
Mr. Memory (Wylie Watson) and Godfred Tearle (Prof. Jordan)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Genre: Thriller
Based on the novel The Thirty-Nine Steps (1915) by John Buchan
The film The 39 Steps is a fascinating
black-and-white spy thriller directed by the film master of suspense and of psychoanalysis
Alfred Hitchcock.
The movie starts showing the main protagonist, Richard Hannay (Robert Donat), participating in an interactive musical where a certain Mr. Memory (Wylie Watson) was entertaining the audience by answering questions from memory. At this event, Hannay met Annabella Smith (Lucie Mannheim) that accompanied him to his apartment and told him that she was a spy who worked to save a state secret; she also mentioned that she was followed by other two agents who wanted her dead. Hannay did not believe a word, but the same night she died stabbed in his apartment – a map in her hand – and Hannay was dragged into this spy story. He succeeded in leaving his apartment disguised as a milkman, leaving for Scotland following the map Annabella Smith had in her hand the moment she died, with the police after him for murder. Here starts the amateur spy adventure of a regular citizen engaged in discovering the state secret and in saving it from being discovered by foreign governments – an adventure that keeps the audience in suspense to the very last scene.
From an artistic viewpoint, this plot is fascinating. It keeps the audience hooked, it engages the audience in Hannay’s adventure, and it takes the audience to different places: in a train, in an inn, among sheep, behind a waterfall, then back to the musical where Hannay met Mr. Memory again and where, this time, he asked him what the thirty-nine steps meant. The dialogue is short, dynamic, and funny at times. The characters are greatly introduced. The music accompanies marvelously Hannay’s spy adventure.
From a technical
viewpoint, I want to stress the film genius of Alfred Hitchcock (1899- 1980) that always attracted and fascinated me.
Firstly, it is Hitchcock’s original
idea to present Hannay’s spy adventures – as inspired by John Buchan’s novel –
by focusing on the human senses. It is a brilliant idea that converges with the
topic of this film, in which Hannay is an amateur relying mainly on his feelings
and on luck.
For example, at the beginning of the
movie, the camera stops on the hand of Annabella Smith holding a map (touch
sense). On the train, Hannay read in the newspaper that the police were after
him, and the camera stops on his eyes (sight). When he reached the inn, the
innkeeper tried to hear what his wife was whispering to Hannay, and the camera
stops on the innkeeper listening (hearing). Finally, when Hannay reached the
house of Prof. Jordan (Godfrey Tearle) – the murderer of Annabella Smith –
there was a party, and Hannay tasted the wine (taste sense), but the camera
stops on the right hand of Prof. Jordan where a finger was missing, as
described by Smith. And the entire movie 'smells' of an international
conspiracy (smell sense).
Secondly, it is about the scene of
the meeting between the protagonist (Hannay) and the antagonist (Prof. Jordan)
which is a scene of fine psychoanalysis. Such one scene is often met in Hitchcock’s
movies.
For example, the ‘room scene’ starts with Prof. Jordan closing the door twice with a key. Hannay sits, he is trapped. At the line ‘she’s been murdered by a foreign agent’ they both stand – which makes Hannay as an amateur spy equal to the professional spy, Prof. Jordan. When Hannay saw Prof. Jordan missing a finger, he understood that he was the murderer and he stood thinking to escape. Hitchcock used a third character, to suddenly open the door from the outside calling Prof. Jordan – which stresses Hannay’s adventure relying particularly on his luck. Hannay moves slowly to the door, and makes small steps; he is followed by the murderer. They both pause: they sit. Hannay resumes his plan to get closer to the door. The ‘room scene’ ends in suspense.
In conclusion,
the film The 39 Steps is a great spy
thriller that engages the audience with suspense and fascinates with the
psychoanalysis of the characters’ behavior. Its plot is about the involvement of a
regular citizen in a dangerous series of adventures. This film succeeds in
conveying the message that all regular citizens should put their country’s
interests above their own life through an artistically crafted plot and through
a brilliant technique that reconfirms Alfred Hitchcock’s film genius.
This movie was considered by film critics as the best adaptation of the novel The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan (1915). It is
the first of a series of five books in which the main protagonist’s adventures
entertained the British soldiers fighting in World War I. Hitchcock’s movie kept
lots of elements from the book (plot, setting, the milkman, the candidate
speech, etc.), and he also used in the movie the black notebook that appears in
the book – a codified conspiracy dairy – that proved to be a lifesaver for
Richard Hannay. But he left aside conspiracy details (countries, names, assassination
dates, etc.). Additionally, he gave a more artistic and musical nuance to the
state secret to be saved.
This is a great movie that I recommend to all ages, at any time during the day or the night! Enjoy it!
#cwp2x, #edx, #UCB, #oldfilmreview, #filmreview, #Hitchcock
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