Review of The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) by Adam F — 28 Jan 2013

While I still feel that The Lady Vanishes is my favorite Alfred Hitchcock films, I don't discredit something like The Man Who Knew Too Much. I haven't seen the American remake that Hitchcock did many years later with James Stewart and Doris Day, but this is a wonderful film, and what seems to be the real beginning of how he makes films.

The film is also notable as being one of the first English-language films starring Peter Lorre, who spoke no English but learned his lines phonetically. The film may not be perfect. It may not be well-drawn out or have characters that we care about as much as we'd like, but it's still a great blueprint for what's to come with Hitchcock's career, specifically The 39 Steps, the remake and North by Northwest.