If you are traveling abroad in an Alfred Hitchcock film, chances are things are going to go wrong. Such is the case in The Man Who Knew Too Much, a very early Hitchcock film that he actually remade twenty years later. The film stars Leslie Banks and Edna Best as a couple on holiday in Switzerland along with their young daughter. Everything is going fine until a friend of theirs is murdered, and in his dying breath he tells them a crucial piece of information about an imminent assassination attempt. The couple has to keep this information safe and sound, but when they deny having any information their daughter is kidnapped and they must try to do all they can to get their daughter back and stop this assassination from succeeding.
The Man Who Knew Too Much has pretty much all the makings of a good film. It has a well thought out and well executed story, well rounded and multi dimensional characters, and with Alfred Hitchcock in the directors chair he obviously does some interesting things with the camera throughout the film. We see a variety of unique shots that would later translate into Hitchcock's overall style of filmmaking. The acting is pretty sub par aside from the great Peter Lorre, but it's not too dreadful.
The thing is, I just wasn't crazy about this film and it really didn't do much for me. The story, while neat and intelligent, is a little disjointed at times and I found myself getting lost pretty easily. The film really tries to be suspenseful, but it isn't at all. This is definitely due to the time period and how much different films were made back then, but I honestly didn't feel anything during The Man Who Knew Too Much.
Hitchcock shows that he will one day grow into a legendary director through some of the unique camera angles and movements he employs in this film, but overall I found the film to be a little lackluster. I shrugged when it was over, and I could not see myself watching this again. It's not an inherently bad film, it's just not much of anything.
The Man Who Knew Too Much has pretty much all the makings of a good film. It has a well thought out and well executed story, well rounded and multi dimensional characters, and with Alfred Hitchcock in the directors chair he obviously does some interesting things with the camera throughout the film. We see a variety of unique shots that would later translate into Hitchcock's overall style of filmmaking. The acting is pretty sub par aside from the great Peter Lorre, but it's not too dreadful.
The thing is, I just wasn't crazy about this film and it really didn't do much for me. The story, while neat and intelligent, is a little disjointed at times and I found myself getting lost pretty easily. The film really tries to be suspenseful, but it isn't at all. This is definitely due to the time period and how much different films were made back then, but I honestly didn't feel anything during The Man Who Knew Too Much.
Hitchcock shows that he will one day grow into a legendary director through some of the unique camera angles and movements he employs in this film, but overall I found the film to be a little lackluster. I shrugged when it was over, and I could not see myself watching this again. It's not an inherently bad film, it's just not much of anything.