Blackmail
                                                                                                        
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Year: 1929
Rating: 6.0
This was Alfred Hitchcock's eleventh film and his first produced in sound. In fact, it was perhaps England's first sound film though there is some disagreement about that. The English film industry was slowly moving to sound but many theaters had not yet converted to it. So, this was released in both sound and silent mode. It was initially planned to be a silent film, but midway through the production company, British International Pictures, changed their minds and asked Hitchcock to make a sound film. Hitchcock was thrilled to and had in fact filmed it with that in mind. The only real issue was that the lead actress, Anny Ondra, had a thick  Czech accent and was playing a London shop girl. But Hitchcock really liked this actress, his first blonde obsession, and so kept her. There was no dubbing capability then and so they had Anny mouth the words while an actress off screen said them. A few years later she was to marry Max Schmeling, the famous boxer.



At this point in his career, Hitchcock had not established himself as the Master of Suspense. Nearly all his films were dramas or romances with the one exception of The Lodger in 1927 about a Jack the Ripper type serial killer. It could be argued that it wasn't until the 1934 The Man Who Knew Too Much that Hitchcock plunged into suspense films for good. But this one certainly nicely falls into that category and has some wonderful Hitchcock flourishes, trademarks and themes that he was to often go back to. Interestingly, in many of his future films it revolves around an innocent person thought guilty while here it is a guilty person thought innocent. It is based on a play by Charles Bennett who was to become one of Hitchcock's main collaborators. Hitchcock brought in a young chap to help him with the script. Michael Powell. Hitchcock asked him to jazz up the final act and Powell said it needed a chase. In the British Museum. Ending up on the roof. Which is what they did.



You can see early on why Hitchcock was infatuated with Anny and how he adores her with close up after close up. Her expressive eyes are captivating, especially later when she fears exposure. She is the girlfriend of Scotland Yard detective Webber (John Longden, who was to appear in a few other Hitchcock films). But she is no virtuous damsel. She gives him the brush off one evening to go out with a charmer (Cyril Ritchard) who gets her up to his studio, talks her into a slip and tries to rape her. Behind a curtain, we see the struggle until her hand reaches out, finds a knife and kills him - all unseen - and then his arm falls out from the curtain.



All very Hitchcockian. Not surprisingly, her boyfriend is put on the case and immediately knows she is the guilty party. Love or duty. Even knowing that she played him like a patsy. Love. He tries to cover it up, but a man (Donald Calthrop) figures out that she is guilty and tries a little blackmail. Now what. An ending that you don't expect. The pacing is slow and the sound is not very good, going silent at times, but this is an interesting look at Hitchcock on his way to becoming the Master. There was of course his trademark cameo.