Johnny Jones (Joel McCrea), a reporter for the New York Globe, has just been assigned to be the newspaper’s foreign correspondent in pre-Second World War England. Jones has no knowledge of anything outside of America – his foreign language skills amount to being able to ask “Parlez vous Francais?”, “Sprechen sie Deutsch?” and pig latin – which is exactly why he was hired – his boss wants someone fresh to the situation, an “unused mind” (which basically means he’s an idiot). As with most Hitchcock movies, out hero (who has been given the pseudonym Huntley Haverstock, but in true James Bond fashion still introduces himself to everyone as Jones) becomes unwittingly embroiled in a murder, and goes rogue attempting to solve it with some friends he has made on his travels.
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Tag Archives: Edmund Gwenn
HitchcOctober Day 18: The Trouble With Harry
Harry is dead. He is found lying in the woods with a bleeding head wound, so when Captain Wiles (Edmund Gwenn) comes across the body whilst out rabbit hunting, he assumes he accidentally shot the man. Unfortunately, Wiles isn’t the only person to happen upon the body, with almost everyone in town traipsing through the copse, including Miss Gravely (Mildred Natwick), Miss Rogers and her young son Arnie (Shirley MacLaine and Jerry Matthews), Dr. Greenbow (Dwight Marfield), a tramp (Barry Macollum) and local artist Sam Marlowe (John Forsythe). All these people have differing opinions of what should be done with the the body, and what might be the cause of his death, with a stolen pair of shoes and a portrait complicating the matter as well.
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HitchcOctober Day 17: Waltzes From Vienna
Johann Strauss (Edmund Gwenn), the famous composer, had three sons. Two of them he encouraged to become composers themselves, but his youngest, Johann Jr. (Esmond Knight) lacked talent to his father’s eyes, and was relegated to being second fiddle amongst his father’s orchestra. Undeterred, Johann Jr. (also known as Johnny) attempts to write his own compositions anyway, and is thrilled when the Countess (Fay Compton) commissions him to apply music to some lyrics she has written. This perturbs Johnny’s sweetheart Rasi (Jessie Matthews) who, as the lowly daughter of the proprietor of a pastry shop (Robert Hale), believes she cannot hope to compete against such a fine woman. Continue reading
The Skin Game
