Tuesday's Forgotten Movies: SABOTAGE
Still watching the Hitchcock films left in this condo.This one comes from 1936. Verloc(Oscar
Homolka)is an anarchist bomber in London pre-WWII Sylvia(Sylvia Sidney plays his unknowing wife An undercover police inspector(John Loder) pretends to be a neighborhood shop clerk but is closely monitoring the couple. Also in the household is Sidney's younger brother. There is a lot of suspense in this film, even an early Disney cartoon, Sidney is lovely and Loder makes a great hero. But I could never get past Homolka's performance. Spend five minutes with him and you know he's up to no good. But there are many great scenes and a shocking ending. Worth seeing but I wish Homolka could have played it with more subtlety. Perhaps Hitchcock couldn't bear to not make it clear where his sympathies lay.
Oh, Hitchcock was such a master, wasn't he? So skilled at building suspense.
ReplyDeleteI saw this years ago and thought Homolka was pretty hammy.
ReplyDeleteJeff M.
There's always ambiguity in a Hitchcock film. These early films show how canny he was as a director.
ReplyDeleteI have always thought this was underrated as it tends to get forgotten among Hitchcock's great rn of 1930s thrillers. I love Homolka but I do know what you mean Patti, there is not much shading there.
ReplyDeleteBased on Joseph Conrad's superb novel The Secret Agent.
ReplyDeleteI always shudder at the powerhouse scene of the boy on the bus.
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