Shadow of a Doubt

A young woman (Teresa Wright) discovers her visiting "Uncle Charlie" (Joseph Cotten) may not be the man he seems to be.

This is classic Hitchcock, and one of Joseph Cotten's finest roles, which is quite a compliment considering how great Cotten is/was. He is dark, misanthropic, misogynistic, and keeps you guessing. That is the beauty of this film: you will debate with yourself Charlie's true identity (maybe he really is who he says he is).

The film has a good deal of suspense, and solid performances from everyone involved. I do not think this is one of Hitchcock's most well-known films, and I am sorry about that. For me, it ranks above "Rebecca" in his catalog. Really a fine film and worth seeing again.

Cinema legend Alfred Hitchcocks' personal favorite film out of his vast resume, "Shadow of a Doubt" is a solid and involving thriller in which cast & crew alike are showcased to great effect. It was co-scripted by Thornton Wilder, Sally Benson, and Hitchs' wife Alma Reville, from a story by Gordon McDonell.

Teresa Wright is appealing as "Young Charlie", a small town girl named after her often-on-the-move Uncle Charlie (Joseph Cotten). She dotes on him, even though she hasn't seen him that much during her life. Then she comes to realize that he has a very secretive, elusive nature, and may in fact have a criminal past that has drawn two detectives (Macdonald Carey, Wallace Ford) to this typical American burg.

The nefarious evil that Charlie could potentially be bringing to town is sharply contrasted with the cheery but unremarkable nature of the community. The excellent supporting cast also includes Henry Travers, Patricia Collinge, Irving Bacon, and Clarence Muse, with a young Hume Cronyn (in his film debut) stealing his scenes as a nosy pulp fiction lover who frequently discusses with Travers how he might possibly murder him without arousing suspicion!

Wright is winning in the central role, the girl who reluctantly must accept the fact that her uncle may not be the kind of man she always believed him to be. And Cotten offers a master class at subtle villainy. You'll never see him chewing on the scenery here.

"Shadow of a Doubt" is definitely far more character and plot-driven than action-oriented, but there is still time for some superior Hitchcock suspense scenes - although the ending is rather abrupt.

This might not get as much press as some of Hitchs' subsequent, even more famous work, but it's still worthy of a great deal of respect.

Eight out of 10.

Often overlooked for his later masterpieces, "Shadow of a Doubt," penned in part by Alma Reville (Hitchcock), is a brilliant, character-driven thriller that stars one of the great, also under-heralded, actresses of the time, Teresa Wright, paired fantastically with Joseph Cotton. The characters are full-bodied. The performances are subtle and affected in all the right places. The exchanges between Henry Travers and Hume Cronyn are spectacular, black comedy gold. One of the few from Hitchcock that might rightfully fall under the category of film noir. Set in filming location Santa Rosa, in the northern part of California that Hitchcock so loved, "Shadow of a Doubt" deftly captures both the innocence and dark crimes and deceptions of mid-twentieth century America. True suspense. This gem is not to be missed.

This was a great movie, that had strong moments of suspense, mystery, terror and also sadness, for the fallen idols, wasted devotion, childhood fantasy morphed into grim adult reality.

Teresa Wright plays Charlotte ("Charlie"), a young woman from a small town, whose dull life is brightened by the visit of her Uncle Charles (Joseph Cotton), her mom's younger brother whom she adores, and whom Charlie idolizes. (She was named after him.) At first, Charlie and her mom, Emma (Patricia Collinge) are delighted with his visit, especially when it appears he wants to settle in their town. Soon, however, Charlie finds out that things are not what they seem, and her beloved uncle may be a serial killer of wealthy widows. The more Charlie discovers, the more determined her uncle is to keep those discoveries from being known, whatever that takes. Meanwhile, a young detective on the case, Jack Graham (Macdonald Carey) falls for Charlie. She's torn between wanting to help her new love, and wanting to protect her uncle, whom she soon starts to see for what he really is.

There's an interesting theory briefly mentioned, when Emma recalls a time when Charles had been injured as a boy when he took a bad fall, and they weren't sure if he'd recover, or if he'd be the same. Could that head injury account for the man he became?

This is one of Alfred Hitchcock's finest.

Alfred Hitchcock's style as a director was a bit like a train – it ran perfectly well, but only along its own lines. He wasn't comfortable adapting his style to suit the material, but when the material suited his style he could do incredible things.

Three years and five pictures into his Hollywood career, Hitch had been having some trouble finding projects he was comfortable with. He had made a couple of adventure thrillers in the vein of his late 30s British films, but the old magic wasn't there. Finally, with Shadow of a Doubt he came upon a project that was right up his street. It represents a welcome return to the domestic murder dramas that had given him his earliest successes (The Lodger, Blackmail), with a storyline ideal for Hitchcock. It is the purest example of murder in a "normal" setting, bringing the audience uncomfortably close to the killer, helped along with plenty of the grisly gallows humour that the Master loved.

Hitch's British pictures had great charm and character, but they were often technically a little haphazard. By now though he knows exactly how to use the camera to manipulate the audience. He begins by carrying us into the story, sweeping in over the city through scenery both pretty and ugly, to home in on an average looking neighbourhood. From then on, every shot, move and edit is calculated to keep up the suspense and unfold the plot. Whereas those early films were swamped and sometimes spoiled by showy camera tricks, Hitch now uses those techniques sparingly, like playing a trump card. For example, he has Joseph Cotton look directly into the camera for a brief moment as he snatches the newspaper back from Theresa Wright. Another trick is to have the camera dolly back as a character advances, only at a faster speed than the actor is moving, which gives a very dizzying effect.

Special mention should also be made of Dimitri Tiomkin's score. Tiomkin was the best composer Hitch worked with before Bernard Hermann, and one of the few who really understood how a Hitchcock film needs to be scored. His sparse string arrangements really capture that sense of spiralling terror without overpowering the scene and turning it into melodrama. He interpolates Franz Lehar's Merry Widow waltz at just the right level, making it noticeable but never overstated– throwing in just a bar or two at an opportune moment, sometimes disguising it in a minor key.

We also have a great cast lined up here. This is among Joseph Cotton's finest performances, which is unusual because Hitch was not a brilliant director of actors. I believe the reason is that, although his soft, honest features meant he usually played clean-cut good guys (as well as making him the perfect choice for the friendly uncle no-one would suspect), he was actually at his best when playing villains. That air of affected friendliness, which gives way to a deadpan monotone, is ironically far more convincing than when he attempted to play genuine niceness. Theresa Wright also does a brilliant job of handling her character's transition from childlike innocence to knowing cynicism. The icing on the cake is a couple of spot-on comic relief supporting parts from Henry Travers and Hume Cronyn.

It's quite appropriate that in his cameo for Shadow of a Doubt, Hitchcock is shown holding all the cards, because here he really did have all the elements working in his favour. It marks the beginning of his golden age and lays down the blueprint for such classics as Rear Window, Vertigo and Psycho. This is about as close to perfect as Hitchcock's pictures get.