The Trouble with Harry

The Trouble with Harry (1955) 

Notable cast/crew: Edmund Gwenn as Captain Albert Wiles.  This was his fourth and final film with Hitchcock spanning 24 years.  John Forsythe as Sam Marlowe.  He would also appear in Topaz.  Mildred Natwick as Miss Ivy Gravely.  Jerry Mathers as Arnie Rogers.  Shirley MacLaine as Jennifer Rogers.  Costumes by Edith Head.  Original Music by Bernard Herrmann.

Running time: 100 minutes

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

Plot: On an Autumn day in the Vermont countryside, Arnie walks through the woods with his toy gun.  He hears gunshots and runs frightened through the woods.  There he stumbles across a body lying on the ground bleeding from the temple.  He runs off towards home.  Captain Wiles has been out hunting rabbits, and he next finds the body and thinks he killed him accidentally.  Miss Gravely comes by as he's moving the man, Harry Worp.  Wiles wants to bury him and hide the whole thing.  She agrees and heads home after inviting him to tea.  Before Wiles can move him, Arnie comes back with his mother, Jennifer.  They know the man, and she's happy Harry is dead.  Next comes along a man reading a book who trips over Harry but doesn't notice him as he gets up and continues walking and reading.  Last a hobo comes through and steals Harry's shoes.

Trick of the lens

Later that afternoon, artist Sam Marlowe goes up on the hillside to sketch the scenery and finds Harry.  Captain Wiles had fallen asleep waiting for everyone to stop passing through.  Wiles awakens and tells Marlowe he thinks he shot Harry.  They decide to check with Jennifer to see whether she plans to notify the police.  If not, they'll bury him.  Before they can hide the body, the man reading, who Marlowe identifies as a doctor, walks through, trips over the body again, and goes along on his way.

Jennifer was married to Harry's brother, who died.  Harry married her to take care of her and Arnie, but wouldn't perform his husbandly duties.  She left him, but he pursued her.  When he tracked her down, she hit him over the head with a milk bottle.  He staggered off into the woods where he died.  Marlowe and Wiles return and bury Harry that evening.  Once they have him buried, Wiles realizes he shot a can, a sign, and a rabbit.  All three of his shots accounted for, and none for Harry.  So they dig him back up.  Looking at the body closer, they see where he was struck in the head, not shot.  Worried that Jennifer or Miss Gravely might be blamed, they bury Harry again.

Miss Gravely thinks she killed Harry because she hit him over the head with her spiked hiking shoe when he, dazed from being hit by Jennifer, assaulted her in the woods.  She decides that she and the Captain should dig him up and report it as self-defense so everything is square with the law.  When they tell Marlowe and Jennifer, Marlowe is concerned the details of Jennifer's marriage will come out.  So they all bury Harry again.

The deputy shows up at the town store with the shoes the hobo stole saying he caught the hobo who took him where the body was, but there was no body there.  The conspirators debate what to do next, and during this all, Marlowe and Jennifer decide to get married.  However, they need Harry to be declared dead for them to get married, so Harry gets dug up again.

They decide to clean him up before reporting him dead, but the doctor comes wandering through again and this time notices the body.  With his poor eyesight in the dark, he agrees to meet them at Jennifer's house to examine the body and tell them the cause of death.  They clean Harry up before the doctor arrives.  Before he shows up, the deputy comes by asking about the sketch Marlowe drew of Harry that matches the hobo's description of the missing body.  They confuse the slow-witted deputy enough to get him to leave.  Wiles had the presence of mind to swipe the shoes from the deputy's car before he leaves.  The doctor arrives and determines Harry died of natural causes.

They lay Harry out in the woods again and have Arnie "discover" him a second time.  Arnie runs home where he will tell Jennifer who will call the deputy, and everything will be okay.

MacGuffin: Harry

Hitchcock cameo: Walking past the artist's stall

Hitchcock themes: None

Verdict: This is a very funny film, dry and deadpan.  It's a pair of romances wrapped inside a black comedy about a dead man no one wants but can't get rid of.  The opening illustrations are excellent and mark this right off the bat as a whimsical film that's going to be different in tone from most of Hitchcock's other work.  The classic shot is of Arnie standing over the body in the background with Harry's feet in the foreground making it look like one person.

This film is well-cast even though Forsythe and MacLaine were not the first choices for the lead roles.  This film marked the film debut of Shirley MacLaine.  It was among the "Five Lost Hitchcocks", and it was one of his favorite films.  The line, "What seems to be the trouble, Captain?" was Hitchcock's favorite line from all his movies.

Location filming in Vermont was hampered by heavy rainfall.  This caused much of the Autumn foliage to be lost, so they recreated it by hand indoors, filming on sets constructed in a local high school gymnasium.  Much of the dialogue recorded there was inaudible due to the rainfall on the tin roof, so a lot of post-recording was necessary.

This was the beginning of the long professional relationship between Hitchcock and composer Bernard Herrmann.  Herrmann would score every Hitchcock movie from this through Marnie.  This score was Hitchcock's favorite of the eight films they did together.

Out of five bananas, I give it:

Next review: The Man Who Knew Too Much