Notorious (1946)

Star Rating: 2

Length of Film: 101 minutes
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains, Louis Calhern, Leopoldine Konstantin, Reinhold Schunzel, Moroni Olsen, Ivan Triesault, & Alex Minotis
Oscar Nominations: Ben Hecht (screenplay), Calude Rains (actor in support role)

Notorious is about a woman from a wealthy family, Alicia Huberman (Ingrid Bergman) who is reckless and hard headed. She meets T.R. Devlin, and he agrees to get in the car with drunk Alicia. She speeds down the highway and gets stopped by a cop. Devlin flashes a badge at the officer, and lets them go (this is the first time we find out that Devlin is an officer). He carries her to bed, and in the morning, while in her hangover state, asks her to be an undercover spy, and get close to fascist Alexander Sebastian (Claude Rains). Devlin suspects that Sebastian is involved with the Nazi’s and needs proof. Alicia agrees, and they both head to Rio de Janeiro.

While there, they fall in love, but while Alicia was getting close to Sebastian, Sebastian ends up falling for her, and proposes marriage. Hints were given that Sebastian was hiding uranium (used to create a Nazi A-bomb) in a wine bottle in his wine cellar. At a party, Alicia slips the wine cellar key to Devlin they go to investigate. Alicia is the lookout, to make sure no one appears. Devlin breaks a bottle, exposing the black uranium powder. Alicia runs to help, and at that same moment, it flashes to the party, where the ice chest of champagne is dwindling down, stating at any moment, servants could enter and bust them. Hitchcock meant it to be very stressful and intense, but it wasn’t.

Sebastian put 2 and 2 together, that Alicia wasn’t there for the right reasons, especially after he sees the wine cellar key missing, and then the next morning it was there on the key ring. He went to the cellar and found a broken piece of glass hiding under the shelf, and knew Alicia was a spy. He talks to his mother about the situation (a mother who has too much power over her son), and she informs him that poison is the only way to control and punish Alicia.

Devlin and Alicia meet at a park bench in the middle of the city, and Alicia showed up and wasn’t feeling well, and excused herself. Alicia then started not showing up at all and that worried Devlin. He stormed into the house demanding to see Alicia. The ending is retarded. There’s no climax, no twist in the plot, it’s like a soufflé that collapses; you’re left disappointed. What’s also disappointing is the personality of Alicia. At first she’s all independent “I don’t need a man” and then she’s “oh, I love you Dev” and it was an immediate switch, there was no growth that over time she became fond of Devlin, it was as quick as a light switch turning on, but it wasn’t believable. I hate how Hollywood portrays couples falling in love so quickly, when it’s not what happens in real life. There’s infatuation at first sight, like lust, but not love.

Alfred Hitchcock movies are hit and miss with me. I’ve seen Psycho, Rope, Spellbound, The Bird, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Rebecca. So far I’ve only been impressed with Psycho and Rebecca.