The filmography of Alfred Hitchcock - Part 1: the 1920's

Alfred Hitchcock, the man who was morbidly afraid of eggs, the man who treated his cast as cattle, the man who wore a suit on set as it was the only appropriate attire for the occasion, the man who liked to do cameo appearances in his films, the man who undeniably left his mark in the art of cinema. He is by far my favorite director of all time and this collection of his films has been a work in progress for a long time. It's still not complete and most likely never will be as there's some of his early works that you just can't find anywhere. I'm not going to list and review his short movies or TV-series episodes, even though I've seen some of them, most of them are so hard to find that it's kind of pointless. I'll split the reviews in decades starting with the silent era of the 20's.



The Pleasure Garden (1925)

This is the earliest Hitchcock movie I've had the pleasure of seeing. It's also Hitchcock's first feature length movie. So as a big Hitchcock fan I was quite excited to see this one. I had already seen some of his other silent era films so this was a big surprise as it was quite Hitchcockian. There's lots of familiar elements you tend to recognize Hitchcock with, like murder, deception, forbidden love and so on. It doesn't have that many movie tricks yet, which are usually common for Hitchcock in his later productions. Though the first scene at the revue with the glasses was quite brilliant. The cast is quite basic silent era cast, who portray somekind of emotions. Though I have to say Miles Mander makes a good performance as Levett who looses his mind. For a movie freak this is a must see, although I don't think others will get that much out of it.
75%



The Mountain Eagle (1926)

No prints of this film are known to have survived and no one has seen it since the late 1920s.



The Lodger (1927)

Didn't take Hitchcock long to get on to his trademark genre of suspense thriller. And his first shot at it is quite an impact. It's a Jack the Ripper like tale of a serial killer terrorising London. It has the Hitchcock trademark style all over it, though really unrefined at this point, but you can still clearly see it. This is the best of the silent era films by the master of suspense and all in all a great movie. As a fun little trivia fact; this is the first film where Hitchcock did a cameo appearance, though in this one he was just filling in for the extras but later on it became one of his trademarks.
85%



The Ring (1927)

Quite an average movie from the Hitchcock's silet era. It's a story of a love triangle in the boxing world. Not the usual thriller you'd expect from Hitchcock, but still a good time piece. Already you can see some of the very innovative camera angles and some scenes are quite impressive. For example the swinging camera, the weird distortions and the knockout are very well made for a movie this old. Also the arm bracelet slip is just brilliant.
62%



Downhill (1927)

Life is not easy for Roddy Berwick, he takes the blame for a crime he didn't commit and that leads to a downhill series of mishaps that end up almost destroying his life. You can see some Hichcockian themes in this one, but it's still quite an odd movie for him. Mostly staying on the tragic side of drama, though of course this being the 20's it's still quite light but still a bit different from what you'd expect from him. As a curiosity piece this was well worth watching, but not really for anyone else who wouldn't care what the master of suspense can get out of a melodrama. The movie can be viewed for free under the creative commons rights at the Internet Archive, the picture quality is fairly ok for a movie this old and there is no sound or music.
55%



Easy Virtue (1928)

This is a movie about a woman who becomes notorious by divorcing her husband. Her husband mistakes the wife for having an affair with another man and the man ends up shooting the husband. After the divorce the press is after the woman and she escapes to France. There she finds a new man and after they get married the past comes to haunt the woman again. The beginning is quite great. Some very nice Hitchcockian tricks and the story is quite interesting. There's even some dark comedy in it when the husband gets shot. But after the woman flees to France the movie takes a dive into quite boring nonsense. Time hasn't been kind to the movie, divorce back then was a bit bigger thing I guess as watching this now it really seemed quite pointless.
39%



The Farmer's Wife (1928)

Hitchcock's silent era shot at the romantic comedy genre. The story was way too obvious to be interesting, but luckily there was enough of those odd comedy parts to keep me interested through the movie. Probably the most "un-Hitchcockian" of all of his movies and pretty much straight forward without any tricks. Still it's a feel good movie with some quite funny scenes. Worth the watch out of curiosity what the master of suspense can get out of a romantic comedy, but not likely going to watch this one again.
45%



Champagne (1928)

Another from the silet era. Definately one of the worst of Hitchcock and quite a dull movie all together. It's about a love triangle again, though this time with a bit of a twist. Mainly focusing on the leading character Betty, played by Betty Balfour, who's contribution to the film is mostly being unintentionally stupid as a boot and looking very confused. The rest of the cast wasn't really impressive either with exception of Gordon Harker who's always fun to watch. Again as always there's some brilliant scenes and camera tricks, like those glass shots, but all in all not really worth the time of the whole movie.
21%



The Manxman (1929)

Hitchcock's last shot at the silent movies is a remake of 1916's The Manxman. Again it has a love triangle, like most of his silent era films. This time a woman, Kate, promises her hand to a man, Pete, who leaves abroad to seek fortune. While Pete is away Kate falls in love with Pete's old friend Philip and as news of Pete's ship being shipwrecked arrive, they plan to marry. But then Pete comes back and things go wrong. Quite a straight forward movie with little interest. The court scene at the end was quite good though, but getting there was pretty boring.
34%



Blackmail (1929)

Hitchcock's first talkie. And really the first completely Hitchcockian film from him. There's tons of great stuff in this one. For example the transition from silent movies to talkies is done superbly. At first you think you're watching a silent movie with an orchestral score and some sound effects to make the mood different but still the same as before, then after the first few minutes of not hearing what people say they just start to talk casually. Just brilliant. Though after reading more about it I found out that the movie was started as a silent movie, but the studio wanted to switch to a talkie. So Hitchcock left some scenes in it from the silent takes and dubbed them later. Say what you will, but I think it works brilliantly. Also the transition from the love triangle stories to thrillers is just something genius. You can also see some of his famous camera tricks in this one and some really beautiful scenes. The cast is quite good, and that's really something as the leading actress didn't even speak English as she was cast for a silent movie. Especially Donald Calthrop makes a great performance as Tracy the blackmailer. A bit too uneven to be a masterpiece but still definitely worth watching and you can clearly see that a master is in the making.
78%


Links to the other decades:
1920's - 1930's - 1940's - 1950's - 1960's - 1970's