According to Wikipedia, Murder! was Alfred Hitchcock's third 'talkie' film and his twelfth film overall.[1] It tells the story of a woman who is discovered at the scene of a murder. At first glance the evidence suggests that she was responsible for the heinous act. However, she has no memory of what happened and so cannot put up a plausible defense. One of the jurors in her murder trial takes it upon himself to ferret out the truth. In execution the film was a combination of Hamlet and The Ox-Bow Incident (even though the latter film was written later).
The film was originally released in 1930, and it shows. The image quality was grainy. The lighting was dark and often the corners of the picture were completely obscured. The editing was often abrupt, though there were hints that the concept of a montage was emerging. The sound was scratchy and the music often sounded brassy. There was one bizarre scene where a turning weather vane was shown accompanied by dialogue from the cast.[2] Sometimes the acting was stylized in a way that didn't jive with the rest of the film.
My verdict: Even though the film suffers from both the primitive state of the art when it was released and the degradation of the original film stock, it is still moderately interesting and enjoyable. The confrontation with the true murderer was surprisingly suspenseful.[3] If you don't mind the poor image and sound quality you'll probably be okay with this film.
Notes:
[1] See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder!.
[2] Even more bizarre is that this scene was chosen to appear as the menu for the DVD.
[3] The dénouement, however, was utterly predictable.
The film was originally released in 1930, and it shows. The image quality was grainy. The lighting was dark and often the corners of the picture were completely obscured. The editing was often abrupt, though there were hints that the concept of a montage was emerging. The sound was scratchy and the music often sounded brassy. There was one bizarre scene where a turning weather vane was shown accompanied by dialogue from the cast.[2] Sometimes the acting was stylized in a way that didn't jive with the rest of the film.
My verdict: Even though the film suffers from both the primitive state of the art when it was released and the degradation of the original film stock, it is still moderately interesting and enjoyable. The confrontation with the true murderer was surprisingly suspenseful.[3] If you don't mind the poor image and sound quality you'll probably be okay with this film.
Notes:
[1] See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder!.
[2] Even more bizarre is that this scene was chosen to appear as the menu for the DVD.
[3] The dénouement, however, was utterly predictable.
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