The Man Who Knew Too Much (1935)

best movie i've ever seen.

A different way of telling a story

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

"The Man Who Knew Too Much" is one of Hitchcock's more famous titles, perhaps because he used it twice. It was even parodied in a pedestrian Bill Murray flick from 1997 called "The Man Who Knew Too Little".The direction in this 1934 version is also very pedestrian. It is all too easy to forget it was made by a great filmmaker like Hitchcock. All too often it feels like the movie you are watching was filmed by someone else who brought a handicam on the set. There are no inventive camera angles, nor any cohesive tone to what you are watching.I thought this was supposed to be a suspense movie. Nothing in it generated any suspense from me - and nor, apparently, did it generate any suspense from the characters. They witness a murder and have their daughter kidnapped. They don't seem particularly upset about it.In an early scene, where people realise someone was just shot through the window in a room they are in, no one seems to put it together that they could have been shot too, and might still be. If someone was just shot in a room you are in, wouldn't you leave that room and go somewhere else?There is a scene right at the end of the movie where gunfire continues uninterrupted for over ten minutes and the camera shows us... something else. As a result, the constant shots become really irritating.

Chronologically this is the third of Hitchcock's suspense masterworks (after THE LODGER and MURDER!) and comes at the beginning of the last third of his UK work.It is a well-paced thriller with a now famously well-known set up. Common man becomes inadvertently drawn into a world of crime. Here a couple learn of an assassination plot and are silenced by the kidnapping of their daughter. Hitchcock himself remade this 22 years later and 45 minutes longer. The plot of Depp's NICK OF TIME also borrows the same narrative.Early on a clever joke involving a piece of knitting sets up a series of laughs, interrupted by the murder. There is the clever switch around of lethal dentist and searching father; the communication of instructions masquerading as hymn lyrics; a fight involving mission chairs; the villain visibly touched by the reunion of father and daughter; the classic Albert Hall assassination scream; the use of a chiming watch to betray its owner – all these are brilliant bits of business introduced by Hitchcock to make the narrative unusual, interesting and wrought with unexpected turns.The whole business except the rescue of the daughter is accomplished at the one hour mark with the remaining fifteen minutes involving the final stake-out, shoot-out and rescue. It is the second use of a rooftop scenario (after BLACKMAIL) to end a Hitchcock film.Most telling is the performance of Peter Lorre as the villain. While all the other actors are playing with great earnestness, Lorre is laid back, nonchalant, careless with ease, making his particular villain a stand-out among the genre. Had there been film awards in those days, his performance would have deserved a nod in the best supporting actor category.It is quite briskly resolved at exactly 1:15. A top notch Hitch suspense thriller and still highly enjoyable.

I have to wonder if I'd think differently of this film had I seen it before the 1956 film. But, such is the course that life can take, I saw the one with Morroco, James Stewart and Doris Day, and Que Sera Sera first. Though that film may have more of the polish of a seasoned professional in 1956 (in contrast to the young upstart proving himself all over after a string of flops in 1934), it benefits greatly from a longer run-time to give more meat on the bones of the story, and a tighter grip on the suspense.Nevertheless, the original film that one could argue got the career of Alfred Hitchcock much on a roll in the 1930's has much to recommend it for. In this story that starts off in Switzerland - "Brotherly Love" except for certain foreign travelers - and a surprise bullet during a dinner party that kills a French spy (with the final words spoken to Jill (Edna Best), on holiday with her husband Lawrence (Leslie Banks) and child and sets a chain of events that leads to kidnapping, an assassination attempt during classical music concert and "Sun Worshipers", it's usually never less than riveting.The director keeps the pace fast - maybe too fast, one could argue. For filmmaking that is so rich and tightly edited and composed with a rhythm that feels just right when Hitchcock and company get into the set pieces, such as the dentist office or the Sun Church, or that final stretch in the gun battle, certain other scenes just feel... flat. All of the main actors are adequate, but it's hard to argue if one prefers this version Banks over Stewart, or even Best over Day. They aren't bad actors in the slightest, but there's little in the way of any personality about them. Best is at her best, so to speak, during that Albert Hall number - actually, I'll give it, she is up to everything else in that sequence and is great.If the plot doesn't leave much room to breathe or anything in the way of character development (different than bits of behavioral humor, which do connect more often than not), there is one ace in the hole for Hitchcock: Peter Lorre. After seeing him in M, he knew he found his Abbot (yeah yeah, odd name, but whatever, this ain't a comedy in THAT way). It's astonishing to read that Lorre didn't know English very well at the time and did the performance phonetically; the way he speaks is cutting at every turn, and he sets the tone for his group of criminals out to wreak havoc on spies and diplomats. He's... cool for such an evil bastard: when the father is anxiously hurling chairs in the church at the other bad guys to get his daughter back, Lorre just leans back on a wall and watches as it happens, knowing it'll play itself out in its way. When things cool down just a bit, he goes face to face with the hero. Close-ups, so intense, with a cigarette always dangling just a little.This is such iconic work for this actor - among his very best, and making it a memorable heel in the Hitchcock canon - that one can (almost) forgive any other flaws in the script, such as rushed exposition, or kind of dropping doing anything with the daughter after a set up with her in Switzerland that made her seem fairly interesting for a minute or two. There's a reason Lorre is on the poster and not Leslie Banks: by the end, it's not like we exactly *want* him to get away, but... the guy's a force of nature, let's put it that way. The Man Who Knew Too Much, both versions, are crackerjack pieces of suspense (with occasional surprise, and there's a difference between the two) and it's admirable how coiled the suspense gets for when it pops.This Hitch guy, watching this, he's going places...

Alfred Hitchcock made two versions of this film. This one and he remade it in 1956. Bob Lawrence (Leslie Banks) his wife Jill (Edna Best) and his daughter Betty (Nova Pilbeam) are a British family on a vacation in Switzerland. They befriend a Frenchman named Louis Bernard (Pierre Fresnay) who is assassinated, but before he dies he tells Jill some vital information to be told to the British Government. The terrorists who killed Louis led by a man named Abbott (Peter Lorre) kidnap Betty so Bob won't tell the police and they go off to get their daughter back. The film works because your invested in what Bob and Jill are doing and you want to see them get their daughter back. Lorre does a good job as Abbott and when I watch the film I still think of him as Hans Beckert from M. I feel the suspense was good but could have been better. Overall I give it 8/10.