Lifeboat Details

Alfred Hitchcock's tense Second World War drama has the distinction of being shot on what looks like the smallest ever film set. The action takes place exclusively on board a lifeboat after a liner is torpedoed by a Nazi sub. As so often in Hitchcock's films, the suspense lies not in the audience being kept in the dark about the identity of the villain, but in making us watch and wait while the characters find it out for themselves. Tallulah Bankhead is the pick of an exceptional cast, but it's all about Hitch's matchless ability to create, shatter and re-create tension until our nerves are frayed.

Based on a Steinbeck novella, the film is both an allegory about the need for unity to combat Nazism and a technological marvel..