Shadow of a Doubt (1943) - Hitchcock Friday #12

Shadow of a Doubt, released in 1943, is one of Alfred Hitchcock’s most admired movies. For some bizarre reason it sometimes gets labelled as a film noir despite not having a single one of the defining characteristics of film noir.

The Newtons are a thoroughly conventional American family living in a small town in California. The eldest daughter Charlie (Teresa Wright) is very excited by the news that her favourite uncle, her mother’s younger brother, is coming for an extended visit. Charlie Newton was named after her Uncle Charlie, Charlie Oakley (Joseph Cotten).

Young Charlie slowly comes to suspect that her beloved uncle, whom she hero-worships, may be a criminal on the run. She slowly pieces together bits of evidence.

We know that Charlie is certainly on the run from something. That’s obvious right from the start. Of course a man might be on the run from many things - gambling debts, gangsters, an unhappy relationship, an irate husband, a minor scandal. All we know is that two guys have been following him.

We also know that Uncle Charlie is rather secretive. He hates having his photograph taken. He hates being questioned about his past.

Those two guys who were following Uncle Charlie turn up in town. They seem very interested in the Newton household. A bit too interested.

Young Charlie is disturbed by the arrival of detectives. She cannot believe Uncle Charlie could have done anything seriously wrong. But suspicion has taken root.

This movie makes an intriguing companion piece to Suspicion, made two years earlier. Both deal with a woman tortured by suspicions about a man for whom she cares. In both cases all the woman has are suspicions. She has no hard evidence.

Hitchcock was a great believer in the essential ingredient of suspense - the audience should know more than the protagonist knows. The suspense comes from the fact that our knowledge makes us fear for the protagonist’s safety. In Suspicion and Shadow of a Doubt he varied that formula. In both these movies the audience also has nothing but suspicions. We don’t know if the man in question is guilty or not. These are movies that combine mystery with suspense.

Both movies have an atmosphere of paranoia but that is not enough to qualify a movie as film noir. Shadow of a Doubt does not employ voiceover narration or flashbacks. The protagonist is not a true noir protagonist. Shadow of a Doubt is beautifully shot (by Joseph Valentine) but it does not have the classic noir visual style. Both these movies are psychological thrillers as well as suspense thrillers but their noir credentials are very very dubious indeed. If Shadow of a Doubt is film noir then every psychological thriller ever made is film noir.

Hitchcock was notorious for preferring to avoid location shooting but unusually Shadow of a Doubt was shot mostly on location. This was his first movie to have a really strong American flavour. Small town America does not serve as a picturesque background here. It is part of the very fabric of the story. It was as if Hitch wanted to shot on location to immerse himself fully in Americana and it worked.

Joseph Cotten gives one of his best performances. Uncle Charlie may or may not be a murderer but he definitely has a jaundiced view of life and yet he has charm and vitality. He’s complex and contradictory. Cotten manages to make him very likeable and very worrying at the same time. Teresa Wright is OK. The support cast is fine. Young Charlie’s father and his pal Herb (Hume Cromyn) provide comic relief with their shared interest in murder mysteries.

As it stands Shadow of a Doubt is a more successful movie than Suspicion although had Hitchcock been allowed to go wth his original ending for Suspicion then it would have been the better movie. Shadow of a Doubt still stands as one of Hitchcock’s two 1940s masterpieces (along with Rebecca). Very highly recommended.

The Blu-Ray looks great and includes an excellent documentary dating from 2000.