Simply A Masterpiece

Best movie ever!

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

When your principle character loses his objectivity, one would think there is a failing in writing and production. But Hitchcock knew this going in. What he also knew is that Selznick, who couldn't keep his rich hands off this film, would be a roadblock. Apparently, this film was very expensive to make and more's the pity. Anyway, a sultry woman is accused of murdering her blind husband. Peck is given the case and must be her advocate. What's unfortunate is that he begins to fall for her, even though he has a wife on the sidelines who is totally aware of what is going on. I won't do spoilers but I will say that Peck's good faith calculations lead to some real complications, things that his own personal myopia disrupt his serious analysis of the case. While it may be a less successful Hitch, it's still pretty darned good.

Equally unlike a 'Rebecca' as it is to Hitchcock's later movies like 'Psycho' and 'The Birds' yet The Paradine Case remains one of my favorite little gems, but to put into words why this is true won't be easy. Nothing about this haunting tale is easy to describe with the standard adjectives of film critique. That's precisely why it stands out, in my mind anyway, as unique. Pure and simply unique. It's an intense crime drama, with some mystery and some romance and not a dull moment or a lull in a compulsion to see it through til the end. I love it for its ambiguity and darkness and haunting plot. There is no forced twist or anything that doesn't ring true while the characters who remain mysterious do not need to be made crystal clear in order for the story to end with satisfactory resolution. The strangest one is the man-servant and Louis Jordan':S debut film. Excruciatingly handsome, we never really get to know what makes Andre Latour tick. But we know he's a dark and fiercely loyal man. And then there's Valli. If you love courtrooms and Gregory Peck and honor and honesty, you'll appreciate what this movie is about. Otherwise you might enjoy it still for its originality and beauty.

THE PARADINE CASE is an interesting but slightly contrived Hitchcock film fraught with sexual tension. I enjoyed most of this film but it could have used better editing and lesser number of characters. The film has some truly strange characters for eg. the wife who longs for her lawyer husband to save her sexual rival in court so that they can fight fairly over the man. ANN TODD and ALIDA VALLI are smoking hot, the two of them even look alike. Hitchcock knew how to select beautiful women for his movies.CHARLES LAUGHTON provides some comic relief during the intense court proceedings.

"The Paradine Case" is a dull, stiff melodrama by Alfred Hitchcock. Based on a novel by Robert Hichens, the film was produced by David O. Selznick, a man who delighted in churning out overproduced prestige pictures. Fresh off the failure of "Duel in the Sun", Selznick exerted an unusual amount of control on "The Paradine Case", his fingers strangling all life out of the picture. He even credited himself with writing the film's script. Hitchcock hated the film.Part murder mystery, part legal thriller, the film stars a wooden Gregory Pack as Anthony Keane, a defence attorney tasked with defending Anna Paradine, a woman accused of poisoning her blind husband. Hitchcock wanted Laurence Olivier for Peck's role, but Selznick disagreed. Selznick wanted Greta Garbo for Paradine's role – she was to come out of retirement – but those plans collapsed.The film's mostly a stagey melodrama, but several scenes allow Hitchcock to flex his muscles. A last act courtroom is imaginatively prowled by The Master's camera, and a sequence in a bedroom recalls Lila Crane's exploration of Norman Bates' bedroom in "Psycho". There are some loose connections to Hitch's other films – Peck's infatuated with and idealises women, as Hitchcock's male leads oft do, and a suicide is brushed aside like a certain Miss Lonelyheart in "Rear Window" – but this is otherwise a routine picture.Most of Hitchcock's films have weird, psycho-sexual stuff going on in between frames. Not so much "The Paradine Case", though it does have a defence attorney whose entire defence functions as a kind of projection of his own feelings toward his client. Peck essentially wills Anna into innocence in order to justify his own feelings toward her, jealously removes prospective lovers from her reach so that he may woo her himself. Even when Anna eventually admits to murder, we're never sure if she's telling the truth or is merely confessing so as to scar her attorney; we can't take her admission at face value. And like the characters in Hitchcock's "Notorious", selfish behaviour is constantly being rationalised as being selfless, characters helping others only in so far it benefits them, resulting in all kinds of weird power relationships.In typical Selznick fashion, the film looks garish, overly ornate and tackily expensive. This is a vulgar looking picture, in contrast to the sleek, pop-modernism/pop-Expressionism of Hitchcock's best films.6/10 - For Hitchcock completists only.