Alfred Hitchcock's "Notorious" opens in a Miami courtroom in 1946 and the conviction of an American man for being a Nazi spy. Shortly thereafter, the spy's daughter, promiscuous and drunken Alicia Huberman (Ingrid Bergman) is recruited by American agent (FBI? CIA?; Hitchcock never makes that detail clear) T.J. Devlin (Cary Grant) to spy on some of her father's old associates who are still up to no good down in Brazil. Despite her bitterness about her father's conviction, it seems that Alicia is a patriotic American, plus, she's fallen in love with Devlin, and she'll do anything for him. Devlin also loves Alicia, but duty calls, and he must ask her to do something very distasteful for the good of the country. However, if only she would say no, or if only Devlin would tell her not to do it.....but then if either of those things happened, we'd have no movie.
Anyway, Bergman and Grant get down to Rio, where they manage to bump into her father's acquaintance Alex Sebastian (Claude Rains), who at one time was in love with Alicia. Before you know it, not only is Alicia insinuated inside off Sebastian's house - remember, she was promiscuous, and Hitchcock and screenwriter Ben Hecht lets you know it despite Hollywood production code mores that forbid such things being spelled out on screen - and before you know it, she's married to the guy!
Despite all this melodrama, this movie is one of Hitchcock's more suspenseful efforts despite there being absolutely no on screen violence or mayhem. Hitchcock manages to wring tension and suspense out of the following elements:
- A key in Bergman's hands
- A wine bottle tippling on a shelf
- The steadily reducing inventory of champagne bottles behind a bar at a party
- Two coffee cups on an end table
- An ending sequence involving Bergman, Grant, and Rains walking down a set of stairs
I'd like to tell you more about that final bullet point, but if I did, it would really spoil the movie for you.
This movie contains one of Hitchcock's most famous shots. The scene opens with a wide view from the top of stairway upon an elegant house party. The camera then slowly zooms in one take to a close-up of Bergman's hand behind her back as she clutches the aforementioned key. This two sentence summary of the scene and the shot does not do it justice. You really need to see it.
It is a movie that is also somewhat famous for a three minute scene of Grant and Bergman kissing. The production code at the time did not allow for screen kisses in excess of three seconds. In this scene, the two of them stare into each others eyes, coyly converse, move from a balcony, to a kitchen, to the doorway, and, while Grant makes a phone call, to the doorway of the apartment, all the time in each others' arms while taking those sub-three second kisses. Kind of a foreshadowing of what Hitch did with Grant and Eva Marie Saint on a train car in "North By Northwest" a dozen of so years later.
It is a movie that also makes "good guy" Grant kind of a rotter, while "bad guy" Rains, who really does love Alicia, becomes an almost sympathetic figure. And the final line of line of dialog and scene of the movie is especially chilling.
Movies don't get much better than when Alfred Hitchcock was at his best, and he was definitely at his best with "Notorious".
Four stars all the way on this one.
