This is another of Hitchcock wartime pictures, when he was really in a transition phase between his British and US periods, with some of the styles of both eras mixed together. He returns to an English setting, but this is moving much more towards the feel of his American pictures.
Hitchcock really gets to develop and splash out on one of his key themes the red herring. Suspicion is really a film entirely based upon misleading the audience. Then again, upon a second viewing you will see there are as many subtle clues as to the actual ending as there are obvious red herrings. Hitchcock also seems to want to be reminding us of his last film of this type, Rebecca. The set-up of the romance in the first twenty minutes of the film bears some similarities. They even have their honeymoon in Monte Carlo, where the de Winters met each other in Rebecca. This was presumably a deliberate ploy by Hitchcock to make the audience think of the extremely troubled marriage of the earlier film.
A nice Hitchcock touch on display here is his way of starting a scene with a burst of music and a revelation, such as when the two leads take that first walk together, and it suddenly looks as if she is struggling in his arms on the cliff edge. Making a scene burst in like that was pretty daring and unconventional at the time but it really makes the audience sit up and take notice. There are a fair few expressionist touches as well, the most obvious example being the immense shadow of a circular skylight which dominates the Aysgarth's house, and looks like a giant spider's web. Joan Fontaine is consistently shown in long shot dwarfed within this shadow.
I have to confess that neither Cary Grant or Joan Fontaine are actors I'm particularly fond of, but they are well cast here and they do a good job. The real treat though is seeing character actor Nigel Bruce (who had a small role Hitchcock's Rebecca) in a slightly larger part as Cary Grant's bumbling best friend Beaky. He is simply the archetypal jolly, blustering upper class Englishman, and he provides some much needed comic relief.
Perhaps the greatest strength of Suspicion is the way in which the audience is forced to travel with Joan Fontaine and share her doubts and suspicions. Cary Grant comes across as genuinely untrustworthy, and the only one who trusts him is Beaky who is so naïve he actually reinforces the suspicion.
Suspicion is not a bad film. Hitchcock was really beginning to consolidate his style here, especially the part that he referred to as "playing the audience like a piano". But still, it's a minor Hitchcock really. I've never really been sucked in by it. It has all the elements that should make it a classic, but none of them are turned up to eleven, so to speak.
Hitchcock really gets to develop and splash out on one of his key themes the red herring. Suspicion is really a film entirely based upon misleading the audience. Then again, upon a second viewing you will see there are as many subtle clues as to the actual ending as there are obvious red herrings. Hitchcock also seems to want to be reminding us of his last film of this type, Rebecca. The set-up of the romance in the first twenty minutes of the film bears some similarities. They even have their honeymoon in Monte Carlo, where the de Winters met each other in Rebecca. This was presumably a deliberate ploy by Hitchcock to make the audience think of the extremely troubled marriage of the earlier film.
A nice Hitchcock touch on display here is his way of starting a scene with a burst of music and a revelation, such as when the two leads take that first walk together, and it suddenly looks as if she is struggling in his arms on the cliff edge. Making a scene burst in like that was pretty daring and unconventional at the time but it really makes the audience sit up and take notice. There are a fair few expressionist touches as well, the most obvious example being the immense shadow of a circular skylight which dominates the Aysgarth's house, and looks like a giant spider's web. Joan Fontaine is consistently shown in long shot dwarfed within this shadow.
I have to confess that neither Cary Grant or Joan Fontaine are actors I'm particularly fond of, but they are well cast here and they do a good job. The real treat though is seeing character actor Nigel Bruce (who had a small role Hitchcock's Rebecca) in a slightly larger part as Cary Grant's bumbling best friend Beaky. He is simply the archetypal jolly, blustering upper class Englishman, and he provides some much needed comic relief.
Perhaps the greatest strength of Suspicion is the way in which the audience is forced to travel with Joan Fontaine and share her doubts and suspicions. Cary Grant comes across as genuinely untrustworthy, and the only one who trusts him is Beaky who is so naïve he actually reinforces the suspicion.
Suspicion is not a bad film. Hitchcock was really beginning to consolidate his style here, especially the part that he referred to as "playing the audience like a piano". But still, it's a minor Hitchcock really. I've never really been sucked in by it. It has all the elements that should make it a classic, but none of them are turned up to eleven, so to speak.