An unusually fine dramatic story handled excellently from a production standpoint. Built along gangster lines, but from an international crook standpoint, with a lot of melodramatic suspense added.

Starts at a party in St Moritz. A man is shot during a dance. He whispers to a friend that there's a message in a brush in his bathroom. Friend realizes the dying man was in the secret service and gets the message. Before he can communicate with the police he is handed a note saying his daughter has been kidnapped and will be killed if he talks.

Back to London and the cops can't make the man or his wife say anything. Finally the man locates the gang's meeting place. He discovers that an attempt will be made to kill a famous international statesman at the Albert Hall that night and manages to communicate that news to his wife, although he is held prisoner.

Scene at Albert Hall is highly exciting and beautifully handled. Acting is splendid most all of the way. Leslie Banks is a fine actor, although the assignment is a bit heavy for him. Edna Best looks well but is not convincing in some of the toughest passages. Peter Lorre's work stands out again. He has to be one of the most impressive and important actors in European cinema in the 1930s. In this picture, he more than makes up for the shortcomings of the other two leads. He's the gang chief.

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Celebrated for his suspense-packed thrillers, macabre plots and twist endings, Alfred Hitchcock is one of cinema’s greatest auteurs. he directed over 60 films throughout his career and The Man Who Knew Too Much is one of his most significant pre-war British films. Starring Leslie Banks and Peter Lorre, this dvd includes an exceptionally rare 1972 interview with Hitchcock, alongside footage of him filming on location in London.

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Hitchcock's original and praised rendition of the dramatic tale of a child's kidnap and recovery from spies trying to ensure her father's silence.

While on holiday in Switzerland, Jill Lawrence and her husband become accidentally involved in murder and intrigue, when an undercover Secret Service agent whispers the whereabouts of a vital message to Lawrence, as he lies dying from a gunshot would.

Splendid early Hitchcock movie with memorable sequences.

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Trivia:

Peter Lorre married Cecelie Lvovsky during the making of the film; Hitchcock had him working that morning, he was married at noon and was back on the set within an hour - and according to Hitchcock Lorre had spent the whole time with the horrific scar make-up that his part required!

The studio where much of the movie was filmed was: Lime Grove Studios, Lime Grove, Shepherd's Bush, London

Patricia Hitchcock has recently allowed a cinema re-release of the original version of The Man Who Knew Too Much.

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Actors:

Leslie Banks, Edna Best, Peter Lorre, Frank Vosper, Hugh Wakefield, Nova Pilbeam, Pierre Fresnay, Cicely Oates, D.A. Clarke-Smith & George Curzon

Dir:

Alfred Hitchcock

Prod:

Michael Balcon

Scr:

A.R. Rawlinson, Edwin Greenwood, Charles Bennett, D.B. Wyndham-Lewis, Emlyn Williams

Ph:

Curt Courant

Ed:

H. St. C. Stewart

Mus:

Arthur Benjamin

Art Dir:

Alfred Junge, Peter Proud

(Gaumont-British)

Dvd Special Features

• Introduction to The Man Who Knew Too Much by Charles Barr
• Aquarius: Alfred the Great - Hitchcock is interviewed on the 1972 Arts programme
• Image Gallery

Technical Details

Catalogue Number: 7952923
Time: 72 mins approx
Region: 2 / PAL (UK & Europe)
Subtitles: None
Sound: Mono / English
Picture: 1.33:1 / Black and White
Number of Discs: 1
Classification: U
Barcode: 5027626292348

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