Sabotage (1936)

Hitchcock Becoming Hitchcock

Director Alfred Hitchcock (1899-1980) began his career designing title cards for silent films. In 1925 his directorial debut, THE PLEASURE GARDEN, was considered such a flop that it was shelved until the later THE LODGER, his first thriller, proved a sensation at the box office, and although his early films vary in terms of subject thrillers quickly became his genre of choice. Released in 1936, SABATOGE does not quite reach same level as the earlier THE 39 STEPS, but it is obvious that Hitchcock is already strongly entrenched in the genre.

The film is loosely based on the Joseph Conrad novel THE SECRET AGENT. Mr. and Mrs. Verloc (Oskar Homolka and Sylvia Sydney) own and operate a cinema in London; Mrs. Verloc's brother Stevie (Desmond Tester) resides with them. Unbeknownst to Winnie Verlock, her husband is a saboteur; as the film progresses he is instructed by his handlers to place a bomb in Picadilly Circus. Unbeknownst to Mr. Verloc, investigators are already on to him--and he and his family are under survelliance by investigator Ted (John Loder.)

The film is famous for two sequences, both of which were considered very shocking at the time and both of which show Hitchcock's method of creating and intensifying suspense in cinematic terms. In the first, the innocent Stevie is duped into carrying the bomb to Picadilly--but is repeatedly distracted and delayed until the bomb explodes on a bus. In the second, Winnie has learned of her brother's death and in a mixture of shock and passion stabs her husband at the dinner table.

According to film lore, actress Sylvia Sydney was outraged when Hitchcock refused to let her "act" the stabbing scene, instead instructing her how to move her eyes and hands in a series of close-ups. These close-ups, however, were part of a carefully designed sequence calculated to build suspense, and the result was remarkably powerful... and Sydney was delighted with the result.

Overall, however, SABOTAGE belongs to second tier of Hitchcock's films and time has taken an additional toll. It will be of more interest to hardcore Hitchcock fans than casual viewers--and they are likely to be frustrated by the nature of the print available, which is only adequate at best. Recommended, but primarily for aforementioned fans.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer August 22, 2008

A gem of story telling

I have heard that Hitchcock thought this film with the bomb exploding as it did a movie makers mistake. When I first saw this movie I thought how far ahead of it's time. It has a realism that I think is refreshing along with the suspense. I can imagine for the times in England these themes of distruction from a foreign enemy haunted the English mind. A story teller's delightful imagination can take over as this film does. Also, I am a fan of Sylvia Sidney, the wife and sister in the film, for if there is a better actress who can protray distress I would like to know who.
These earlier film of Hitchcock shows his abilities as they are blossoming. July 5, 2007

"But she said it before. Or was it after? I can't remember..."

This moody thriller from Hitchcock's British period blends a somber and tense storyline with a budding romance born from circumstance; something that would become a staple of his American films. While it may be just a tick below "39 Steps," "The Lady Vanishes," and "Young and Innocent" from the same period, it isn't far behind.

One of the reasons it reaches the level it does is the lovely Sylvia Sydney. She is simply fantastic as a girl in a dangerous and somber situation whose smile ignites the screen every single time it happens. She is married to Oscar Homolka who seems harmless enough but in fact is a saboteur.

British police are hot on his trail and as Ted (John Loder) tries to discern whether Sydney is involved or just an innocent bystander, he falls in love with the sweet girl who takes movie tickets and cares for her little brother Stevie.

The audience falls for Sydney too in this film based on Joseph Conrad's Secret Agent. The photography of Bernard Knowles adds atmosphere and tension to some truly exciting moments in Charles Bennet's screenplay. The film starts slowly but gradually draws the viewer in because they care about Sydney.

When the sabotage escalates to a bomb intended for Picadilly, Sylvia's husband uses young Stevie to deliver it. But he is delayed and the viewer is on the edge of their seat watching the clock tick down while Stevie rides the double-decker, the outcome very much in doubt. Sylvia's fate will be in doubt also as an impulsive act will have Ted trying to shield her from the consequences because he loves her.

A great ending makes up for the slow start in a film carried by Sydney's bee-stung lips and smile like sunshine. Hitchcock fans don't want to dismiss this one from his British period. You'll become a fan of Sydney's after watching it as well.





March 19, 2007

A somewhat overlooked Hitchcockian gem that packs quite an emotional punch

The genius of Hitchcock is best seen in his early British films. Back in the 1930s, working with relatively unknown actors and actresses, low budgets, and seemingly rather straightforward scripts, Hitchcock's eye for detail, unique mastery of cinematography, framing, and lighting, and most of all his unsurpassed ability to generate suspense put him in a directing class all by himself. Speaking of suspense, Sabotage packs a particularly nasty punch in that department, resulting in what I consider one of the most memorable cinematic sequences in my own personal experience. Those excruciating moments, and the events they set in motion, make Sabotage a disarmingly powerful, surprisingly emotional film.

The story, adapted from a Joseph Conrad novella, centers around a seemingly harmless cinema run by the Verlocs, foreigners seemingly well-adjusted into life in London. Karl Verloc (Oskar Homolka) is apparently supposed to be German (he sounds a lot like Bela Lugosi, so I initially took him for an eastern European of some sort), while his wife Sylvia (Sylvia Sidney) and her brother Steve (Desmond Tester) came over from America a year earlier. The film opens with a blackout of London, a happenstance we quickly learn to be an act of sabotage committed by Mr. Verloc. Scotland Yard, already suspicious of the man, has a man working undercover at the neighboring grocery (John Loder), but he doesn't have enough evidence to nab the guy. As he cozies up to Mrs. Verloc to see if she knows anything, the mysterious group Verloc is reluctantly working for make plans for a much larger demonstration of their presence (using terrorism to distract England's attention from what is already taking place on continental Europe in this year of 1936).

As you can see, the viewer knows exactly what is going on and exactly what is planned for the near future, but rest assured that Sabotage is in no way lacking in the suspense department. The critical scenes in the movie are rather excruciating and even a fair bit shocking, setting up an ending that might look rather clichéd on paper but proves quite fascinating onscreen - in large part due to Hitchcock's masterful direction. Raw emotion radiates off the screen as Hitchcock proves, even at this relatively early stage of his career, that he is much more than a mere master of suspense. December 18, 2006

Listen all a' y'all

There are probably still some purists out there who feel that the work of Alfred Hitchcock really began to falter after his move to America in 1940. At the time this was quite the deal in the world of film, and there were more than a few critics and industry insiders who from then on thought of Hitchcock as a bit of a sellout. Hitchcock had earned his reputation in England directing films that, while low on budget, were more than high on suspense, excitement, and talent. Their financial limitations and removal from the Hollywood system gave the films a sparse, yet brilliantly photographed and desperately urgent feel uncommon to the banality of many American productions. Among these early films lies "Sabotage," a film slightly scant on story and somewhat emotionally muddled, but nevertheless at times terribly suspenseful and honestly affective.

The movie's story is somewhat ambiguous and the film itself seems almost aware of its unimportance, only bothering to offer a few scant lines of dialogue to explain the motivation of the saboteur. Karl Verloc (Oskar Homolka) is the owner of a cinema in London who also commits acts of sabotage for a terrorist organization, in, it is explained, the hopes of drawing attention away from larger plots afoot on the continent. Who Verloc is working for, or for what particular reasons, personal or professional, are never made abundantly clear, but given that the film was made in 1935 and Verloc is a German immigrant, one can assume that the film was meant to serve as a warning of the trouble brewing in Europe. But the film does not seem fully committed to this theme, and the set-up suffers because of it. The film also centres on Verloc's wife (Sylvia Sydney) and her brother Steve, who are unaware of Verloc's little hobby, but soon find themselves swept up in the intrigue surrounding his treacherous dealings. John Loder plays the next door grocer, Ted Spencer, who we soon find out is actually an undercover Scotland Yard detective who keeps tabs on Verloc while making passes at his wife.

Hitchcock is famously quoted as saying that a scene of a man with a bomb under his chair is not suspenseful unless the audience is aware of the bomb while the man is not. "Sabotage" quite literally takes this advice and through its use finds a scene of such tension and anxiety that it truly makes the film. The lead up to this scene in intriguing, and the remainder of the film somewhat devastating (if not a tad jumbled), but the scene of Steve's trip to the London Underground is among the finest of any Hitchcock film. One of the true virtues of this scene, and of the film as a whole, is the cinematography, which at times is heartily reminiscent of the best of German expressionism. The way in which Hitchcock, along with director of photography Bernard Knowles, frames and lights his close-ups is often masterful, and works to fully render the tension and conflicted anarchy of Verloc and the film as a whole. Watch for the scene where husband and wife talk in close-up confinement, until she leaves and abandons him and the camera pulls away to show Verloc alone in the now noticeably spacious frame, and you will see Hitchcock's eye for the expressiveness of the medium. It is with such touches that Hitchcock manages to bring an incredible amount of value and intrigue to a film of such basic plot.

The end of the film gets lost a bit in its rather forced romantic sub-plot. Spencer's final perusal of Mrs. Verloc comes across as highly inappropriate, but considering her reaction I do believe that this sentiment was somewhat intended. Sidney is marvelous in this latter part of the film and scenes such her looking for her brother in a crowd are heartbreaking. The finale is a bit too deus ex machine to blend in seamlessly, but the film has enough honest emotion and unapologetic suspense to more than make up for its shortcomings. I have seen only a handful of Hitchcock's UK films, but with them one sees a Hitchcock without the stars, without the large budgets, without the exotic locales; a Hitchcock totally dependent on the sense of scenario and tremendous talent behind the camera that first earned him his reputation. I think most would agree that Hitchcock went on to prove his critics wrong with an illustrious and always interesting American career, but with films such as "Sabotage", where his talents are revealed at the roots, you can see why the purists were initially skeptical. July 20, 2006

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