Retro Review: The 39 Steps (1935)

As much as I appreciate the indelible mark director Alfred Hitchcock left on the horror and thriller genre, I’ve seen very little of his work. ¬†Before watching The 39 Steps tonight, I had only seen The Birds and Psycho. ¬†But I had a dream last night that they were showing Vertigo in a newly converted 3D version and the worst part was that I wasn’t upset about this bastardized version of such a classic, likely due to the fact that I’m starved for the man’s work. ¬†So I guess my noodle decided it best that I would be watching a Hitchcock film this evening. ¬†In fact, given that I’ve had basically no aim with this column since the 70s sex comedy theme from January, I think I’ll start focusing on more of his cannon at some point in the future.

The film opens during an on stage demonstration by a man who “learns 50 facts a day” and can answer any question thrown his way. ¬†After a few erroneous questions that are either too personal or about the future, a man asks Mr. Memory to rattle off the distance between Winnepeg and Montreal. ¬†After answering effortlessly, a scuffle ensues in the audience and shots ring out. ¬†The building is evacuated and it’s here that we meet our hero, Richard Hannay (Robert Donat) as he helps a distraught Annabella Smith (Lucie Mannheim) to her feet. ¬†She then asks Hannay back to her apartment, to which he somewhat reluctantly agrees. ¬†Once there. Smith reveals that she is a spy and casually drops the phrase “39 steps.” ¬†Later that evening while Hannay is sleeping, Smith bursts into the room and staggers to the edge of Hannay’s bed. ¬†Sadly, she dies and reveals a giant knife has been stabbed into her back. ¬†In her hands she clutches a map of Scotland with a home circled. ¬†Hannay then chooses to track down this home in search of answers for Smith’s demise.

And I’ll stop the story talk there! ¬†I will say that just due to the old fashioned way the story is told, I had to supplement my viewing with a look over the wiki page for the movie. ¬†That’s more of a knock against my inability to process older flicks than it is the film’s storytelling skills. ¬†There were actually quite a bit of things I liked here. ¬†I especially appreciated what was likely one of the earliest uses of a McGuffin technique throughout the film. ¬†The 39 Steps goes from being a throwaway piece in a conversation between two strangers to the mystery Hannay is trying to uncover throughout. ¬†It’s no surprise that this same device is famously used in a lot of Hitchcock’s work to much success.

But the biggest surprise was the camera work and trickery used to create this film.  A few times I got the sense that these guys had learned how to do wipe edits and such since there is a slight overabundance but you have to cut them some slack considering this movie was made in the early 1930s.  Probably the most impressive shot was a scene that started as a conversation in a car and then, with an invisible edit, we move to the outside of the car and see it zoom down the hillside.  These sort of shots are commonplace now but I was actually taken aback when it showed up.  Not only because it looked so good but even more since the same shot composition is used to this day.

I’ll keep it short in lieu of more Hitchcock films to come here in the Retro Review column. ¬†I liked this movie and that’s an accomplishment since I had no idea what it was about before hitting play in the Netflix Instant Queue. ¬†The version I watched looked fine for a streamed movie but did have a lot of noticeable blemishes on the transfer at the beginning. ¬†To be honest, this broken down aesthetic kind of made me enjoy the film more but I’m sure there’s a better restored version out there somewhere if you feel that would be a problem. ¬†The 39 Steps might not be a movie that floors you, but if you’re any kind of film history buff than you should check it out. ¬†And if you have Netflix with the ability to stream movies, you really have no excuse.

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