Jolly Ol' London is in the grip of a serial killer called the "Necktie Killer," as he rapes women and strangles them with neckties. We start off with a group of people finding his latest victim in the Thames, and then we jump over to one Richard Blaney (Finch), a down-on-his-luck barman who is trying to get on his feet. He has dinner with his ex-wife, Brenda (Leigh-Hunt), and she slips him some money. That becomes relevant because the next day, Brenda is raped and murdered by the Necktie Killer, who turns out to be Bob Rusk (Foster), a Covent Garden fruit merchant who is just so friendly to everyone, including Richard.
Brenda's secretary (Jean Marsh) spots Blaney leaving Brenda's office just before finding her dead (he tried to go and see her but found the door locked, so very reasonably assumes she's not in and leaves). She reports this to the police; meanwhile, Blaney goes to find his girlfriend Babs (Massey) and takes her to a hotel. They discover he's wanted as the Necktie Killer and try to flee the country, as Blaney figures (quite rightly) that the police will assume he's guilty, and they might have made it, except Rusk spots Babs and offers her his apartment to hide out until the boat leaves. You can probably guess where this is going.
Blaney is arrested for the murders (including Babs', who winds up stuffed in a potato truck and falling out onto the highway) and sentenced to life, but by then he's figured out who's really responsible and loudly says so. The Chief Inspector (McCowen) on the case figures that they've got the wrong man (hey, better late than never) and they wind up catching Rusk, just as he's coming back to his apartment to put his latest victim in a trunk.
So, I had never heard of this movie, and it was kind of viewed as a return to form for Hitchcock. It's a pretty good example of neo-noir, in that no one in the movie is really clean. Indeed, until Rusk goes to see Brenda and makes it clear in pretty short order that he's going to kill her (more on this in a moment), we're not 100% sure that Blaney isn't the killer - he's impulsive, occasionally violent, and definitely harboring some anger at his ex and possibly women in general.
But no, it's Rusk, who is socially functional, charming and likes to be in the middle of everything (he refers to himself as "Uncle Bob" and cheerfully offers to help Blaney with some money in the beginning of the movie).
As is often the case with Hitchcock, the cinematography is amazing and very deliberate. There are two scenes in particular that I think are pretty important. One is Brenda's assault, and the other is a dinner.
Sexual assault scenes in movies are often done badly, and smarter people than me have written on this at length. Suffice to say that such scenes are often shot like sex scenes with tenser music. This one...is not. For one thing, it's long, and that means we get to watch Brenda's horror as she realizes that she's in danger, and it builds as she realizes first that Bob is going to rape her, and then what's actually happening as he takes off his tie. The sequence of her reciting Psalm 91 intercut with him repeating "Lovely!" is honestly one of the most effective bits of filmmaking I've seen, and the shot at the end of the scene, of "us" (the camera) moving down the stairs, holding on the door as Brenda's secretary goes up, and just waiting for the scream we know is coming is fantastic.
And then there's dinner. McCowen's wife (Merchant) is learning to cook gourmet French food, and the first time we see her do it, she serves her a fish soup that is truly one of the most disgusting-looking things I've ever seen. But the scenes (there are several) like this are played for humor and also exposition, so we get the Chief Inspector talking through his process with his wife (who, as a chef, makes a great detective).
My point is, there's a lot of genius on display here. The performances are great, but they're actually secondary to the direction and cinematography. As an aficionado of horror movies, I love seeing one that is actually disturbing rather than just violent, and this one truly is.
My Grade: A
Rewatch Value: Probably medium-high?
Rewatch Value: Probably medium-high?
Next up: Gosford Park
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