Saturday Night Cinema: Notorious

22

Tonight’s Saturday Night Cinema classic, Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious, is a masterpiece of suspense, love, mystery and seduction. It’s one of my favorites. Not just a spy film, Alfred Hitchcock’s 1946 classic Notorious is “a perverse love story that presents one of the most anguished relationships in American film.”

Alfred Hitchcock’s “Notorious” is the most elegant expression of the master’s visual style, just as “Vertigo” is “the fullest expression of his obsessions.”

The virtuoso sequences — the long kiss, the crane shot into the door key — are justly famous, yet the film’s real brilliance is in its subtle and detailed portrayal of infinitely perverse relationships.
Dave Kehr

Story continues below advertisement

Written by one of Hollywood’s greatest screenwriters, Ben Hecht, the film stars Cary Grant as a charming and unscrupulous government agent and Ingrid Bergman as a woman of low repute whom he morally blackmails into marrying a Nazi leader (Claude Rains, in a stunning performance).

NOTORIOUS
By Bosley Crowther
Published: August 16, 1946

It is obvious that Alfred Hitchcock, Ben Hecht, and Ingrid Bergman form a team of motion-picture makers that should be publicly and heavily endowed. For they were the ones most responsible for Spellbound, as director, writer, and star, and now they have teamed together on another taut, superior film. It goes by the name of Notorious and it opened yesterday at the Music Hall. With Cary Grant as an additional asset, it is one of the most absorbing pictures of the year.

For Mr. Hecht has written and Mr. Hitchcock has directed in brilliant style a romantic melodrama which is just about as thrilling as they come—velvet smooth in dramatic action, sharp and sure in its characters, and heavily charged with the intensity of warm emotional appeal. As a matter of fact, the distinction of Notorious as a film is the remarkable blend of love story with expert “thriller” that it represents.

Actually, the “thriller” elements are familiar and commonplace, except in so far as Mr. Hitchcock has galvanized them into life. They comprise the routine ingredients of a South American Nazi-exile gang, an American girl set to spy upon it, and a behind-the-scenes American intelligence man. And the crux of the melodramatic action is the peril of the girl when the nature of her assignment is discovered by one of the Nazis whom she has wed.

But the rare quality of the picture is in the uncommon character of the girl and in the drama of her relations with the American intelligence man. For here Mr. Hecht and Mr. Hitchcock have done a forthright and daring thing: they have made the girl, played by Miss Bergman, a lady of notably loose morals. She is the logically cynical daughter of a convicted American traitor when she is pressed into this job of high-echelon spying by the confident espionage man. The complication is that she and the latter fall passionately and genuinely in love before the demands of her assignment upon her seductive charms are revealed. And thus the unpleasant suspicions and the lacerated feelings of the two as they deal with this dangerous major problem form the emotional drama of the film.

Obviously, that situation might seem slightly old-fashioned, too. But Mr. Hecht and Mr. Hitchcock have here treated it with sophistication and irony. There is nothing unreal or puritanical in their exposure of a frank, grown-up amour. And Miss Bergman and Mr. Grant have played it with surprising and disturbing clarity. We do not recall a more conspicuous—yet emotionally delicate—love scene on the screen than one stretch of billing and cooing that the principals play in this film. Yet, withal, there is rich and real emotion expressed by Miss Bergman in her role, and the integrity of her nature as she portrays it is the prop that holds the show.

Mr. Grant, who is exceptionally solid, is matched for acting honors in the cast by Claude Rains as the Nazi big-wig to whom Miss Bergman becomes attached. Mr. Rains’s shrewd and tense performance of this invidious character is responsible for much of the anguish that the situation creates. Reinhold SchŸnzel and Ivan Triesault are good, too, as Nazi worms, and a splendid touch of chilling arrogance as a German mother is added by Madame Konstantin. Louis Calhern and Moroni Olsen are fine in minor American roles.

Check up another smash hit for a fine and experienced team.

NOTORIOUS (MOVIE)

Produced and directed by Alfred Hitchcock; written by Ben Hecht; cinematographer, Ted Tetzlaff; edited by Theron Warth; music by Roy Webb; art designers, Albert S. D’Agostino and Carroll Clark; released by RKO Radio Pictures. Black and white. Running time: 101 minutes.

With: Cary Grant (Devlin), Ingrid Bergman (Alicia Huberman), Claude Rains (Alexander Sebastian), Louis Calhern (Paul Prescott), Madame Konstantin (Mrs. Sebastian), Reinhold SchŸnzel (Dr. Anderson), Moroni Olsen (Walter Beardsley), Ivan Triesault (Eric Mathis), Alex Minotis (Joseph), Wally Brown (Mr. Hopkins), and Sir Charles Mendl (Commodore).

The Truth Must be Told

Your contribution supports independent journalism

Please take a moment to consider this. Now, more than ever, people are reading Geller Report for news they won't get anywhere else. But advertising revenues have all but disappeared. Google Adsense is the online advertising monopoly and they have banned us. Social media giants like Facebook and Twitter have blocked and shadow-banned our accounts. But we won't put up a paywall. Because never has the free world needed independent journalism more.

Everyone who reads our reporting knows the Geller Report covers the news the media won't. We cannot do our ground-breaking report without your support. We must continue to report on the global jihad and the left's war on freedom. Our readers’ contributions make that possible.

Geller Report's independent, investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our work is critical in the fight for freedom and because it is your fight, too.

Please contribute here.

or

Make a monthly commitment to support The Geller Report – choose the option that suits you best.

Quick note: We cannot do this without your support. Fact. Our work is made possible by you and only you. We receive no grants, government handouts, or major funding. Tech giants are shutting us down. You know this. Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Adsense, Pinterest permanently banned us. Facebook, Google search et al have shadow-banned, suspended and deleted us from your news feeds. They are disappearing us. But we are here.

Subscribe to Geller Report newsletter here— it’s free and it’s essential NOW when informed decision making and opinion is essential to America's survival. Share our posts on your social channels and with your email contacts. Fight the great fight.

Follow Pamela Geller on Gettr. I am there. click here.

Follow Pamela Geller on
Trump's social media platform, Truth Social. It's open and free.

Remember, YOU make the work possible. If you can, please contribute to Geller Report.

Join The Conversation. Leave a Comment.

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spammy or unhelpful, click the - symbol under the comment to let us know. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

If you would like to join the conversation, but don't have an account, you can sign up for one right here.

If you are having problems leaving a comment, it's likely because you are using an ad blocker, something that break ads, of course, but also breaks the comments section of our site. If you are using an ad blocker, and would like to share your thoughts, please disable your ad blocker. We look forward to seeing your comments below.

0 0 votes
Article Rating
22 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
william couch
william couch
5 years ago

All of Hitchcock’s movies are award winners..

livingengine
livingengine
5 years ago

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12566/spain-anti-israel
Valencia, the third-largest city in Spain, has approved a motion to boycott Israel and slander it by declaring the city an “Israeli apartheid-free zone.” The move comes days after Navarra, one of Spain’s 17 autonomous communities, announced a similar measure. In all, more than 50 Spanish cities and regions have passed motions condemning Israel. The proliferating anti-Israel activism, driven by the rise to power of the political far-left, is establishing Spain as the EU member state most hostile towards the Jewish state.

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago
Reply to  livingengine

What has the political events in Spain have to do with the movie being presented on this thread?

Joy Daniels Brower
Joy Daniels Brower
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

Well, what’s happening in Spain today would make a fantastic backdrop for a Hitchcock-style film noir/thriller!

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago

Pick a country. Any country. Same thing.

But to comment on any political situation when on a thread about movies – WITHOUT claiming to recommend a new scenario – is pretty well an indicator that something is off with the commenter. It’s much the same with sports players/commentators being political instead of concentrating on the game they were hired to play/report.

In other words, “Inappropriate”.

Joy Daniels Brower
Joy Daniels Brower
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

Oh, so we’re the “appropriateness police” here I see! I just had a funny thought and expressed it! Sorry I offended your very easily offended sense of propriety!

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago

I didn’t know they had such a police force. Did you think that was a crime, to be inappropriate? Perhaps not in the right place, nor right time, but not a crime, so police are not called upon.

Did I say I was offended? Gee, sorry about that, I wasn’t. I was just making a comment and giving an example. Sorry you could not understand that simple concept, and sorry that I hurt your poor little feelings.

livingengine
livingengine
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

I thought it was an open thread.

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago
Reply to  livingengine

Open thread, true, but shouldn’t everyone be on the same subject at least? Otherwise some will be talking politics and others will be talking cartoons, and then the confusion will be worse than Keystone Cops.

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago

The fact that the kiss is expanded to over two minutes beyond the industry’s standard of three seconds or less was interesting the way it was done. Certainly makes it rather erotic. This goes to show why the entertainment industry is as crude as it is today: Filmmakers and producers find every way to push the limits of conventionality until we have today what would get people arrested in the early ears of film making: profanity, death, depravity, criminality and other vile things that are praised by the media.

I will bet that Pamela never even considered this implication – pushing of standards.

felix1999
felix1999
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

I’m not sure we have any standards today.

We rarely go to the movies. Netflix has less viewable stuff and with Obama using it for a propaganda tool, it may be time to dump that too. You tube has some older shows we like.

GeneP54
GeneP54
5 years ago
Reply to  felix1999

I agree. I watch a lot of the old ones on YT and on National Archives.

Most of the newer stuff is junk and perverse, often with some political agenda. I’ll take the old black and whites any day! Can’t beat Hitch! Love film noir!

poetcomic1
poetcomic1
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

Hitchcock invented a kind of American ‘tantric sex’ with a kiss that stops and starts and goes on and on.

oceanfloor1
oceanfloor1
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

Not sure why a 2-minute romantic kiss is “lowering standards”.

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago
Reply to  oceanfloor1

Because at the time, the STANDARDS were that a kiss could last only three seconds. Did you miss that? Because I DID state that!

Another film that lowered standards was “Gone With The Wind” in 1939. In that film, PROFANITY (oh, dear, the HORROR) was allowed in film, when Rhett Butler was to say, “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn!” (yes, back then, such a word was not spoken in polite public).

I remember going through Basic Training in the USAF, and the drill instructor had a final word as we were allowed to go on leave en route to our first assignment: “Men, in the past few weeks, you have learned a whole new plethora of words. When you get home, remember that when you ask your mother to pass the butter, DON’T DESCRIBE IT! (and yes, he did SHOUT the final words).

Nowadays, there are no standards in film, other than to see what filmmaker can gross out the public faster. The only “standards” are to put a sticker on the ads saying what the film has in it – nudity, profanity, violence. In those days, other than violence, nothing was “tolerated”.

oceanfloor1
oceanfloor1
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

The “standards” of the time were puritan nonsense and don’t ask smartass questions, I don’t need lectures from a spiritual old maid like you.

Sunshine Kid
Sunshine Kid
5 years ago
Reply to  oceanfloor1

So you cannot read nor comprehend, and when you’re called out on your failure to understand plain English, you go on the liberal snowflake tactic of insulting what you have no idea about. You call the standards of those days (in which I lived, mind you) “puritan nonsense”, but the fact of the matter is that in those days there was far less violence, and people respected each other, something you obviously cannot do.

Then you tell me not to ask smartass questions. Well, if you weren’t such a dumb idiot that cannot read, I wouldn’t ask questions that you obviously cannot answer.

Considering that you hurl insults, here’s your picture, showing how you have progressed from the civilized to the not so civilized:

comment image

Joy Daniels Brower
Joy Daniels Brower
5 years ago
Reply to  oceanfloor1

You’re in a good mood, aren’t you? These folks are just relating how “strict” the old Motion Pictures Ass’n standards were before the 60s turned everything upside down!

Alleged-Comment
Alleged-Comment
5 years ago
Reply to  Sunshine Kid

A kiss is just a kiss – unless your Bill Clinton. Hope I solved everyone’s problem here. 😉

MAS
MAS
5 years ago

Oh for the days when directors masterfully manipulated your imagination and Hitchcock was the king of innuendo! Instead today we have nothing more than gutter porn sprinkled with gore…

poetcomic1
poetcomic1
5 years ago

Two great kisses frame this film. The famous ‘long’ kiss and the final ‘rescue kiss’ in exquisite close up (Ingrid never looked more beautiful). One tends to forget that Hitchcock was a thorough going romantic in his films.

DemocracyRules
DemocracyRules
5 years ago

Famous love scene in Notorious
– some say the best ever
– was a Hitchcock workaround of the rules
– Hollywood decency rules limited movie kisses to a few seconds
– so Hitchcock strung a bunch of kisses together
– separated by 2 or 3 second interruptions
– and that actually made the scene more passionate
– than 1 long kiss would have done
– Hitchcock worked out every tiny detail of every scene
– before he began to shoot

Sponsored
Geller Report
Thanks for sharing!