Murder – 1930 | 92mins | Thriller | B&W

Plot Synopsis

Hitchcock prepared two versions-English and German-of his next effort, Murder (1930). Herbert Marshall in his first talking picture is a fancy big time actor serving on a jury; convinced of the innocence of a young actress (Norah Baring) who is on trial for murder, he tries to solve the case to save her life. There are some snobbish bits that appear to ridicule the ‘lower orders’ – apparently the unfortunate results of attempts at improvisation. Hitchcock experimented with a stream of consciousness monologue and there’s a tricky sequence in which Marshall listens to Tristan on the radio while he shaves. (The entire orchestra was behind the set playing simultaneously with the scene, since music could not be dubbed in later.) The actual murderer turns out to be a transvestite-daring at the time. Hitchcock called the film “the first important who-done-it picture I ever made!’. The German version was called Mary and was also made at Elstree.

Extract© Richard A. Harris, Michael S. Lasky: The Complete Films of Alfred Hitchcock.