Suspicion Details

A marvellous Hitchcock thriller, with timid Joan Fontaine in mortal fear of being bumped off by her husband, amoral Cary Grant. Fontaine won the best actress Oscar for her pouting female-in-trouble portrayal, though some believe it was to compensate her for not winning the award for Rebecca the previous year. It all begins well enough, with Grant's bounder Johnnie Aysgarth a most unlikeable cad. But the film is hopelessly crippled by the censorship of the time, and is ultimately both predictable and implausible. Nevertheless, there's much to enjoy, not least a totally phoney Hollywood England — Hitch never bothered too much about art direction, and reaches a near-nadir here worse than Marnie with poor studio “cliffs” and weak back projection. There's also sterling support work from British expatriates like Nigel Bruce and Cedric Hardwicke, and lovers of the book Before the Fact by Frances Iles might enjoy watching how Hitch decides to deviate from his source. But the two leads are undeniably in their prime, and reason alone to watch.

Rather artificial and stiff Hitchcock suspenser, further marred by an ending suddenly switched to please the front office. Full of the interesting touches one would expect.