Suspicion

Suspicion (1941) 

Notable cast/crew: Cary Grant as Johnnie (the 1st of four Hitchcock films).  Joan Fontaine as Lina (she previously starred in Rebecca).  Sir Cedric Hardwicke as General McLaidlaw (he would also appear in Rope).  Nigel Bruce as Beaky (he had been in Rebecca).  Dame May Whitty  as Mrs McLaidlaw (she was previously in The Lady Vanishes).  Isabel Jeans as Mrs Newsham (marking her third and final Hitchcock film).  Leo G Carroll as Captain Melbeck (the 2nd of 6 Hitchcock films).

Running time: 99 minutes

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Plot: Johnnie encounters Lina on a train and imposes on her for some change to pay his fare when he comes up short.  She obliges and recognizes him in the society page.  He next sees her at a fox hunt and recognizes her as the woman from the train and finagles an invitation into meeting her.  She initially resists his advances, but hearing her parents' talk that she's turning into a spinster changes her mind.  She begins to despair after several cancelled dates, but she then receives a telegram from Johnnie telling her to meet him at the next ball.

Got milk?

Johnnie insinuates himself into her father's party at the ball since he has no invitation of his own and sneaks off with her.  Johnnie does not think her father cares for him and openly comments about it.  There is a whirlwind romance followed by a hasty elopement and honeymoon.    He buys her a house with a staff of servants.  But then she learns he has no money.  He's a cad who has conned and worked angles his entire life to get by while maintaining a high society lifestyle.  She convinces him he needs to get an honest job and to stop borrowing money.

Her father sends them antique chairs as a wedding gift which suddenly go missing.  Johnnie's friend Beaky shows up and mentions Johnnie has been racking up gambling debts and bets the chairs were sold to pay them.  It turns out he had indeed sold them.  Beaky laughingly suggests Johnnie is less than forthright about how he sold them which upsets Lina.  Lina is more upset when she sees the chairs in an antique shop which confirms Beaky's suspicion.  He sold them to pay his bookie and in turn parlayed that into a winning bet at the track.  Then he bought the chairs back.

She finds out more and more about Johnnie and comes to believe he is of poor character and that legal action is going to be taken against him for his debts.  She considers leaving him.  Her father passes, and Johnnie is disappointed with the inheritance having hoped to cash in and pay off his debts.  She later counsels Beaky not to let Johnnie use his money to fund a business venture where Johnnie alone controls the finances.  This upsets Johnnie.

She begins to suspect Johnnie capable of murder to solve his financial plight.  Beaky turns up dead in Paris, heightening her suspicion.  Johnnie had been with Beaky but went missing right before his death.  He returns home saying he left Beaky in London.  She suspects Johnnie of having murdered Beaky to get the money that was invested in their corporation.  She then suspects Johnnie may be planning her murder when she finds a telegram informing him that a loan against her life insurance cannot be made: it will only pay out on her death.

He brings her a glass of milk which she supposes to be poisoned and refuses to drink.  He takes her to her mother's for a vacation, but he flies around curves causing her to fear he's trying to kill her.  They have it out, and she finds he has been contemplating killing himself to get out of his debts.  He was not in Paris with Beaky, and she has misjudged him.  They return home to face their trials together.

MacGuffin: None

Hitchcock cameo: Posting a letter at the village post office

Hitchcock themes: 

• Blondes
• Identity
• Murder

Verdict: This is a well-regarded movie, but it starts slowly and is undercut by the ending.  The movie is well-cast, and Joan Fontaine won Best Actress for it (although some think she was rewarded as a make-up for not having won for her superior performance in Rebecca the previous year, which I concur with).  The film was nominated for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay.  In the most famous scene, where Johnnie brings a glass of milk up to Lina, there is a light hidden in the glass to make it stand out with an ethereal, sinister glow.  There is an earlier scene where Lina faints, and her dress billows out beneath her like pooling blood.  It is a subtle hint at her state of mind as murder has just been suggested for the first time.  Hitchcock would use this effect much more blatantly and effectively in Topaz.  The dog in the movie was Hitchcock's: a Sealyham Terrier named "Johnnie".

Hitchcock originally wanted the ending from the book the movie was based on: Johnnie to be guilty, but the studio insisted that the public wouldn't accept Cary Grant as a murderer.  As William L. De Andrea states in his Encyclopedia Mysteriosa, Suspicion "was supposed to be the study of a murder as seen through the eyes of the eventual victim."  In Hitchcock's own words: "Well, I'm not too pleased with the way Suspicion ends.  I had something else in mind.  The scene I wanted, but it was never shot, was for Cary Grant to bring her a glass of milk that's been poisoned, and Joan Fontaine has just finished a letter to her mother: 'Dear Mother, I'm desperately in love with him, but I don't want to live because he's a killer.  Though I'd rather die, I think society should be protected from him.'  Then, Cary Grant comes in with the fatal glass, and she says, 'Will you mail this letter to Mother for me, dear?'  She drinks the milk and dies. Fade out and fade in on one short shot: Cary Grant, whistling cheerfully, walks over to the mailbox and pops the letter in."

Hitchcock's ending was never filmed. Several reasons for changing Hitchcock's preferred ending to the one in the movie have included: the audience reacted badly to Hitchcock's preferred ending (unlikely if the ending had never even been shot), the studio (RKO) wouldn't allow Cary Grant to play a murderer, and the Motion Picture Production Code of 1930 (the Hays Code) mandated that a murderer could not get away with it in the end.

Regardless of the reason, the change to Johnnie being misunderstood undercuts the tension and suspicion that has been building throughout the movie around his character and makes Lina look like a twitchy nutcase.  It's an okay film, but it's overrated for my tastes.

Out of five bananas, I give it:

Next review: Saboteur