Notorious (1946)

  Notorious (1946)

Spellbound was an interesting entry in Hitchcock’s oeuvre.  On the surface, it is very much a thriller/romance with his stamp on it.  However, the overbearing nature that reportedly was David O. Selznik most definitely surrounds the piece, which isn’t all together bad as he truly seemed to have a consistent style almost like a director: grandiosity and melodrama surrounding tales full of love.  Lucky for us, the cash strapped produced sold The Master, Ingrid Bergman, and Cary Grant to RKO Studios for a flat fee.  Long story short, people were getting “notorious” in 1946 with the movie Notorious (I was going for some joke there… I’m tired).

With Bergman sticking around after their last flick, we find her playing a boozy socialite immigrant whose father has recently been put away for… actually I don’t remember, but something like war crimes (as I happened to be misguided and skeptical this would be a good film it took me time to start paying attention; you can chastise me later).  Anyway, good ol’ Cary Grant comes along as an FBI agent who wants her to work as a spy for good ol’ America (lots of “good ol’” references in the 40s).  Bergman’s character falls for Grant’s, Grant’s falls for Bergman’s, together they rise to the upper echelon of the Justice system, and the film becomes a funny romantic romp where they fly around the world doing fun spy pranks on Nazis!  It’s Hitchcock’s first all out screwball comedy!!!

Its probably pretty evident I’m delving into ridiculousness here with that description, but in all honesty everything until they fall in love is true.  After they fall in love however, complications arise when a request from the FBI puts Alicia (that’s Bergman’s character; should be obvious so that’s why I didn’t tell you) in the midst of a possible Nazi war criminal organization.  As she begins fraternizing with the lead villain Alexandar Sebastian (played wonderfully by Claude Rains; you should’ve known this too) we get ourselves a complicated love triangle as our two leads search for evidence of what this crazy evil organization out of James Bond’s universe has got their necks up to!

OK, you may think I’m being difficult writing this, or acting strange for some annoying reason.  Part of it is I am tired, and have come into the realization I’m winning when I get more than 7 hours of sleep (hint: I’m not winning right now).  The other part, however, is that this film is such a foundation for Hitchcock and the modern spy genre as we know it that I feel compelled to not go into too many details.  The mystery, suspense, and romance are all out in full force with various emotions building throughout to an unexpected conclusion.  And did I mention romance?  Not necessarily always having that emotion on the top of my film-going wish list, the love story presented here is truly palpable and wonderfully sensual in all of its forced and unforced restrictions (ratings restrictions and plot restrictions, respectively), not to mention the arguably symbolic release from Selznik’s grasp (how symbolically justified!). 

While these may appear as hasty generalizations, and even as I always seem to praise even The Master’s lesser works in this series, Notorious stands out as what has to be one of his best.  The cast is solid and the story is tight, giving us a film that succeeds on all cylinders while delivering a form factor that would continue through the 60’s spy thrillers all the way to modern Bourne-area cinema.  

Have you ever heard of a McGuffin?  If yes, watch for it here.  If no, Google that ASAP, then watch for it here.