Notorious

Rating:
Summary: Stunning example of Excitement, Intrigue and Romance
Review: Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman and Claude Rains lead an amazing cast through a world of suspence and romance. Hitchcock manages to fuze together a "strange love affair" with an all too suspenseful and escalating situation to throw viewers into a very involving and entertaining story. Rightly considered one of the greatest films Hitchcock ever made, this movie deserves a place on your shelf not only for its involving story but also its astonishing and skillful direction by argueably the greatest director of all time. No one better could lead a person through this world better than Hitchcock. An amazing and thought provoking film that should not be overlooked.

This DVD tends to be a bit expensive with its Criterion Collection features. The extra features of this DVD which include deleted scenes and alternative ending script ideas is a welcome bonus, and the commentaries from Hitchcock scholars are also very entertaining and informative. Don't let the price scare you away from owning this incredible movie.

Rating:
Summary: One of Hitchcock's finest ever
Review: Top-notch espionage thriller with all-star cast consisting of :
Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, and Claude Rains. With a very similar plot to the much later made Mission Impossible II
it has the daughter (Bergman) of a man convicted of treason living in Miami and a debonair secret agent (Grant) spying on her and trying to convince her to help the United States goverment in capturing some spies that her father worked with during World War II. One of the spies "just happens" to be an "old flame"(Rains)who still wants to marry her. Of course by the time they (Grant and Bergman)get to Rio de Janeiro (where the spies are in hiding) they have inevitably fallen in love with each other. Bergman marries Rains, the "old flame" spy to get closer to him and find out anything important. But eventually Rains finds otu that she and Grant are American agents and he starts trying to poison her. Then Devlin finds out and comes to the rescue,. Being a gem of a movie that I highly reccomend, I think you will enjoy it immensely.

Rating:
Summary: Hitchcock Spy Thriller Set in Rio....
Review: Nazis, atomic energy, and a love story combine to make this a sexy thriller. Cary Grant, as Devlin of the FBI, and Ingrid Bergman, as Alicia Huberman, playgirl and Nazi spy's daughter,
work together and play together. Their job is to determine just what a group of German expatriate scientists is doing in Rio. (Remember, this is taking place in the immediate aftermath of World War 2.)

The group is led by Claude Rains, dapper as ever, but this time a mama's boy. He's infatuated with Bergman, and asks her to marry him. She does, but when Rains discovers Bergman's working for the Americans, Rains and mama, played to a t by Madame Konstantin, begin poisoning her.

The wind-up here is exciting and frightening. Stick around, this film is great anytime.

Rating:
Summary: Classic post-war Hitchcock film
Review: An intriguing spy thriller, packed with Hitchcock's favourite themes and details. A good film always begins with a good script, of course, and Ben Hecht has written a dark, lively, noir-ish script, full of deception, subtle shadings, and twists. Ingrid Bergman is perfectly cast as Alicia, the "notorious" woman caught between love and duty. The character compares herself to Mata Hari, but Mata Hari was certainly never so beautiful photographed. You can tell how deeply Alfred Hitchcock was in love with Ingrid Bergman, in the many langorous close-ups. Cary Grant makes a very good Agent Devlin--this performance was in his formative years, before he became a self-parody. Claude Rains, although notably old for his part, is wonderfully conflicted and on-edge, and gives a great performance. The other "player" worth mentioning is the city of Rio de Janeiro, shot in beautiful black-and-white in all its 1940s glamour and glory. The city is as integral to the film as, say, Venice is to the 1973 film "Don't Look Now." "Notorious" is not Hitchcock's best film, by any means, but remains watchable and still remarkably fresh more than 50 years after it was made.

Rating:
Summary: Espionage in South America
Review: Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman make a wonderful leading couple in this spy-thriller from suspense master Alfred Hitchcock. Grant is an intelligence agent for the FBI called upon to work with Bergman, the daughter of a Nazi spy. But she's no Nazi. She agrees to travel to Brazil to infiltrate a group of Nazi scientists working on atomic energy.
Claude Rains plays Alex Sebastian, a businessman who heads the group and who had and still has an eye for Bergman's character. When Bergman agrees to marry Sebastian, watch what happens.

Rating:
Summary: A Masterwork of the Cinema
Review: One of my 3 Favorite Hitchcock films. The first I really discovered and was the one that started my interests in Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman as well as Hitchcock. A Tight little story about how we allow our judgements about others to be clouded by deceptions. Deceptions of our own making and from the feeding of them by others. a mix of Romance, Comedy, Espionage and of course Suspense. Beautifully restored for Criterion DVD. You know it's worth it! Spend the few extra dollars!

Rating:
Summary: Well, it's Hitchcock
Review: ...So it's not going to be, like, BAD. But this is not only Hitchcock but CRITERION COLLECTION Hitchcock, which is extra-good because of all the bonus features. There are some really good commentary tracks by film scholars (fancy that) on the disc--actually worth watching. Plus the movie is fantastic. So yeah, I recommend this very highly.

Rating:
Summary: Devilishly Entertaining!!
Review: NOTORIOUS is one of Hitchcock's best thrillers, with heart-pounding suspense and a sensational cast to boost: Ingrid Bergman, Cary Grant, and Claude Rains, who all deliver superb performances. Their chemistry alone makes the film worth watching. Bergman plays Alicia, the daughter of a disgraced father, who is recruited to infiltrate a post-World War II spy ring in Brazil. Alicia is known for her drinking and apparent promiscuity, and due to her reputation, is asked by an agent named Devlin (Grant) to fly to Rio and insinuate herself into the household of a spy ring led by Sebastian (Rains). Sebastian once loved her, and perhaps he still does. Devlin is essentially asking her to share the spy's bed to discover his secrets. She is willing to do this because by the time he asks her, she is in love with him, and apparently, he with her. This mixture of romance and suspense work perfectly for a devilishly entertaning thriller. It all comes together in a suspense-filled, surprising, and emotional climax. A classic must-see thriller!! This is Hitchcock in top form...

Rating:
Summary: Fine release of a Hitchcock Classic, why pay more?
Review: Having already reviewed the wonderful film "Notorious" this review deals with the DVD releases in question. Reading the reviews praising Criterion Collections "great acheivement" over Anchor Bays "bare-bones" release lit a fire under me. The fact is most re-viewers even those with high-end equipment came to DVD direct from VHS land. DVD is their first experience with Criterion releases.
I, for better and for worse, was part of the 1 percent of the population who ventured into the world of high tech video and the Audio-Video receiver and sound system, years before anyone had heard of DVD, with the Laserdisc. The Criterion Collection (formerly the Voyager Collection) put out very expensive editions of Classic films on Laserdisc for years and the results to say the least were mixed. Part of the problem was that Laserdisc technology steadily improved over its 20 plus year run and studios like MGM were able to best many of Voyager/Criterions releases with stronger more colorful releases over time. Others discs were, frankly, just average releases being sold at inflated prices, so inflated in fact that I picked many out of bargain bins. Having collected over 200 titles on Laserdisc, not counting multiple copies of some titles I came to DVD with both good and bad examples of Criterions work over the years.
Now having seen the Criterion Collection as well as the Anchor Bay versions of "Notorious" I cannot believe some of the reviews praising the Criterion editon are genuine. The opening credits of "Notorious" are windowboxed, making them almost minature even on a large screen moniter. While I agree that Criterion does exhibit better overall contrast and fewer skips, this, however, does not compensate for such heavy grain that the picture is severely compromised in several scenes (even viewed on just a 27 inch Proscan TV) and dust is apparent everywhere. Anchor Bay's 2.0 mono may have less definiton when played on a very high end system than Criterions 1.0, but Anchor Bay's still had more volume overall and the softer and far cleaner video image was more pleasant to watch. Considering that the Criterion edition, even deeply discounted, was triple what I paid for Anchor Bays DVD made me glad I had rented it first. Unless you want to own the extras on the Criterion release, which are substantial, I would recommend a rental first. Thanks, CAL

Rating:
Summary: Forget MI2. The original is still superior!
Review: Do you remember that plot device in Mission Impossible 2 (2000) where Thandie Newton is used by the IMF force to get close to Dougray Scott because Newton was his old flame? Well, believe it or not but Tom Cruise was not the first person to pull off that little bit of disingenuousness on the silver screen. Alfred Hitchcock used that same act of deception fifty years earlier with Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, and Claude Rains serving as the main chess pieces. In Notorious (1946), Bergman is the manipulated woman whose shady past leads the United States government to use her to spy on suspected Nazi activity following the end of World War II. Rains is the suspected Nazi operative who is engaged in a plot in Rio that prove suspicious to U.S. agent Cary Grant and his associates. Because Rains had once loved Bergman and still does, Bergman is used by her government to gather information which would expose Rains. Matters become complicated as Grant himself falls in love with Bergman and he becomes drawn into the operation on a more personal level. Making comparisons between this film and John Woo's Mission Impossible 2 proves enlightening as the adage "less is more" is shown to be especially apt when looking at these two films. Unlike MI2, there are no glossy drawn-out chases and shoot-outs that overstay their welcome in Notorious. Yet, Notorious is still the more entertaining film because it is able to generate more suspense even without the kinetic set-pieces. Notorious is more concerned with telling a story rather than using a story to justify the existence of action sequences. Watching the classic ending where Rains ascends the staircase while having his fortunes descend at the same time packed more of an emotional whallop than any kung-fu kick John Woo choreographed. Notorious serves as a shining example that Hollywood excess may be effective in generating revenue but a failure when it comes to generating satisfying films.