|
|
VHS Videos - Blackmail
|
List Price: $9.98
Our Price: $0.25
Your Save: $ 9.73 ( 97% )
Availability:
Manufacturer: Republic Pictures
Starring: Sara Allgood, Joan Barry, Ex-Det. Sergt. Bishop, Harvey Braban, Johnny Butt
|
Average Customer Rating:   
|
|
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9786303073767
Format: Black & White
ISBN: 630307376X
Label: Republic Pictures
Manufacturer: Republic Pictures
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Republic Pictures
Release Date: 1998-05-19
Running Time: 84
Studio: Republic Pictures
Theatrical Release Date: 1929-10-06
|
|
|
Spotlight customer reviews:
|
Customer Rating:
Summary: Hitch Brings The "Talkie" To Britain
Comment:
"Blackmail"
A pair of gloves is the only evidence in a murder case. One is found by the detective working the case, the other by a sinister eyewitness who wants to "Blackmail" the killer. No, this is not a TV movie about OJ Simpson, this is early Hitch!(Only he could have known.)
In 1929 Alfred Hitchcock was already displaying his innate senses of style, suspense, shadowy figures, sensuality and lets not forget his wonderful sense of humor. This film has all those qualities that makes his films so recognizable.
Alice is bored,and steps out on Frank, her Scotland Yard boyfriend. Her "date" offers to paint her portrait. She agrees, but once in his apartment, he attacks her and she kills him in self defense.
The investagation leads her Detective boyfreind to realize she is the killer, but keeps it to himself. There is another witness, one that can blow the lid off the whole case. Alice's guilt is getting the best of her(shades of "Tell Tale Heart" by Poe). Will she turn herself in before it's too late, or will they keep this secret buried.
"Blackmail started out as a silent but with films like the "Jazz Singer" opening in the States, Hitch decided to add sound to this one making it the first British "Talkie". The film stars Anny Ondra (she's marvelous)as Alice,John Longden as Frank, and Donald Calthrop as the blackmailer.
Looking for Hitch: I spied him in the first 10 minutes in quite a comical cameo, don't miss it!
A wonderful look at an early film of a budding genius. Hitch fans will enjoy this one!....Laurie
Customer Rating:
Summary: Well worth a look
Comment: This movie was one of the first Hitchcock movies I ever saw, and it made me want to see more. It was the first "talkie" filmed in Britain, and the lead actress, Anny Ondra, had to be dubbed due to her thick accent.
Ondra stands out to me, she is a delight as the blackmailed young lady. It is a pity that she was not used again by Hitchcock.
Customer Rating:
Summary: PRIMITIVE TALKIE A'LA HITCHCOCK.
Comment: A young woman woman flirts with a man much to the dismay of her fiance, who leaves in anger. She and her new handsome artist friend go to his studio where he persuades the young lady to pose for him - a'la naturel; tragedy ensues. A surprisingly taut and suspenceful film, although the sound techniques are primitive and scratchy. This is an early Hitchcockian example of what was to become the director's specialty: the leading player is a victim, caught in circumstances beyond his control. Hitchcock disliked Ondra's reedy voice, and it was dubbed by an actress named Joan Barry: it was a painstakingly difficult feat considering the primitive techniques of early sound films: it took many takes before the speech was in sync.
Customer Rating:
Summary: I like this movie and I don't
Comment: This movie is better than the other versions and even though it is a Hitchcock I still don't like it that much. This was Hitch's first talkie, but not a good start. I don't think it was super but it beats the other two versions by a long shot! Watch it and see what you think!
Customer Rating:
Summary: One giant step forward for movie fans
Comment: BLACKMAIL, made as a silent film by Hichcock and ultimately dubbed, produced one giant step forward for movie fans. It is worth all of the price to see the hugely innovative camera work that Hitchcock used to roll out this 1929 movie. He took a simple story that really needed no more than a stage; connected the scenes with interesting movement and understandable transitions; then held your attention with camera work decades ahead of the time. The bonus of the movie is watching the actors ham it up--especially the nasty extortionist--using a mime-expression style of acting for its' 1920s time so that the audience always, without fail, recognized the villain seducer, always taciturn hero, guilty woman, tough detective, slimey blackmailer, etal. As an extra bonus, the story made certain that nobody nice was sent to jail. If the story had been filmed today, the blackmailer would have gone up in flames after falling from the British Airlines ferris wheel, but in 1929 Hitchcock did the next best thing and . . . well, I say, you'll have to watch the movie to see the blackmailer's appropriate finish. My final, extra bonus, was watching Scotland Yard's Flying Patrol in their patrol wagon; the radioman receiving apparently morse code messages through a headset. Ah! Ah! How this movie had history . . . .
|
|
|
Editorial Reviews:
|
|
Blackmail was originally conceived as a silent picture, but since it was made in 1929, just as British studios were converting to sound, director Alfred Hitchcock talked the producers into letting him reshoot much of the film. The result is a legendary British thriller and an early Hitchcock exercise in guilt and sexual perversion. The film's most famous sequence reveals the director's brilliance at manipulating the new medium. It features a terrified young woman who has returned home after stabbing a would-be rapist. Sitting at breakfast with her family, she flinches every time anyone says the word knife. Gradually the conversation becomes inaudible to the woman and to us, except for the word knife, which grows louder with each repetition. When finally called upon to pass the bread knife, the woman falls apart, unable to touch the object that resembles the weapon she had just wielded. While Blackmail will fascinate fans of the great director, it is a superb psychological thriller in its own right. --Raphael Shargel
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
