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Summary: one of Hitch's best
Review: This is one of my favorite Hitchcock movies. The dynamic between Grant and Bergman is one of the best captured on film. The Criterion treatment did not disappoint. The extra features were good and the film transfer only had a few spots and scratches.
The menus were done very well with various scenes from the movie.
The only drawback to the Criterion movies is the cost. I know a lot of work goes into them, but they are just too expensive.
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Summary: Bergman & Grant beging good at being bad.
Review: Bergman is a drunken trollop, Grant is a sadistic cad.
This is elegant, sly, witty and very naughty.
eat em up yum.
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Summary: "A classic black romance."
Review: Bergman is employed by U.S. agents to infiltrate spy-ring headed by Rains. Grant plays her slick control agent, treating her with disdain while developing a strong romantic bond with her. One of Hitchcock's greatest films, Notorious features the director at his most devilishly elegant, self-assured best. A visual masterpiece, the film is seamlessly pieced together like a jigsaw puzzle. Some of Hitchcock's most notable camerawork can be found here. Lots of tension-filled scenes and one very memorable love scene. A classic black romance.
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Summary: beautifully restored film with lots of dvd bonus features
Review: It doesn't get much better than this -- a Hitchcock film starring Ingrid Bergman, Cary Grant and Claude Raines! What a treat it is to see all of this talent -- behind, and in front of, the camera. The story of a star-crossed romance set against the backdrop of post-WWII Miami and Rio, the film has a great script and terrific acting. The direction is awesome; Hitchcock did some wonderful camera work here -- innovative tracking and crane shots that are a delight to see.This Criterion Collection DVD edition is more expensive but I think it's worth it -- a lot of time and effort have been taken to restore the film and the soundtrack, and it really looks and sounds great. Also, the many bonus features are excellent: excerpts from 'The Song of the Dragon', a two-part Saturday Evening Post short story on which the film was based; fascinating production correspondence by David O. Selznick, Ingrid Bergman, J. Edgar Hoover and the head of the Production Code Administration (censors); rear projection and production stills, including wonderful shots of the scaffolding used to get that breathtaking crane shot from a stairtop balcony right down to the key in Bergman's hand; script excerpts from deleted scenes and alternative endings; a music and sound effects only track; trailers; the complete 1948 Lux radio Theatre version of the story, starring Ingrid Bergman and Joseph Cotten; terrific voiceover narration with film scholar Marian Keene discussing artistic choices and film historian Rudy Behlmer discussing technique; and a touching story about the fate of the Unica key -- the one used in the film. Language and subtitles are English only. This is a wonderful package for one of Hitchcock's best films. Highly recommended.
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Summary: Notoriously good
Review: Hitchcock's polished and ingenious direction was far beyond what most directors were capable of doing in 1946, as he shows in this delightful spy/romance story. This film is full of beautiful camera work, including lovingly framed portraits of Bergman, skewed-angle shots of Grant and Rains, dramatic use of lighting, and other masterly touches. The acting is uniformly superb, especially Bergmann, Rains, and Madame Konstantine as Rains's eagle-eyed, autocratic mother. As in the best Hitchcock films, the action moves along briskly without a wasted shot. Great escapist entertainment!
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Summary: INGRID BERGMAN GLOWS IN A HITCHCOCK GEM
Review: In "NOTORIOUS," Alfred Hitchcock directs a luminous (in some scenes, she actually glows) Ingrid Bergman and an atypically somber Cary Grant in a suspenseful romantic allegory of love and betrayal in Nazi infested post War Rio. Claude Rains is memorable and as the villain understandably in love with Ingrid Bergman.
In 1999, Anchor Bay released a DVD of this title with no significant extras. Criterion's transfer has a sharper, detailed image with rich blacks (although in some scenes there's a noticeable graininess) and a much cleaner audio clarity. There's a fascinating commentary by film scholar and Hitchcock expert Marian Keane that's a scene-by-scene analysis of Hitch's artistic choices and sophisticated visual metaphores. It's hard to know how much of the symbolism within the frame was intentional, but Keane's commentary makes a strong case for Hitchcock being a filmmaker of great precision with a personal interest in the psychological make-up of characters yearning for love, but trapped between hope and fear. There's another commentary track by Rudy Behlmer that deals with the production itself. And Roy Webb's music is given a separate audio track. Other extras include a brief excerpt of "The Song of the Dragon," the short story on which the film was based. There are dozens of production stills and several of producer David O. Selznick's legendary memos. Also, newsreels of the premier and stars, trailers, and script excerpts of deleted scenes and alternate endings. And there's a terrific, complete 1948 broadcast of the Lux Radio Theater's version of "Notorious" with Bergman and Joseph Cotton.
"Notorious" is sensual, tense and thrilling and one of the great films of the 40s that still resonates. Ben Hecht's tight script and Hitchcock's economical direction are a perfect match. In some ways, this is fairy tale about a beautiful princess imprisoned in a castle controlled by an evil stepmother. Will the handsome prince rescue her before all is lost? But on a grander level, "Notorious" is a brilliant and timeless film noir that mirrors the damaged post war world with characters caught up in unimagined moral ambiguity and ambivalence as they seek a greater good. And where love hurts.
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Summary: Criterion is NOT the Paragon of Quality
Review: The folks at Criterion have successfully spun for themselves a reputation of utmost quality, what with their self-serving linear notes and "important" choices in films, but upon viewing some of their releases of classic films, I've come to the conclusion that this is mostly pomp and bluster. Criterion has NOT done justice to some incredibly important films, such as this one. See the other reviews for details. Another example of their shoddy (but expensive) work is their release of "Time Bandits," which includes FAKE widescreen (cropping off the top and bottom of the picture for absolutely no reason), and similar shadyness concerning certain Kurosawa films that they released. Don't believe the hype about Criterion standing for quality. They don't. They DO however stand for higher prices.
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Summary: Criterion Disk
Review: Criterion's DVD of NOTORIOUS is a nice addition to my Hitchcock collection. I thought I'd seen this film, but actually had not. The first third of the film is a bit slow, although the acting is superb (Ingrid Bergman is excellent here). Once Bergman's character shacks up with her former German lover, the film gets very exciting. The Unica key scene is thrilling; the wine cellar scene is full of suspense (Will the party run out of wine?? Will Cary Grant and Bergman be discovered?? Excellent suspense!) Hitchcock is, by and far, "the master of suspense." The disk has Criterion's usual attention to detail. I love the package art. The extras are great, including alternate endings illustrated by script excerpts. Also, memos from Selznick and the Ratings Board are interesting. My one complaint is about a bonus section on the fate of the Unica key. A narrator describes how, years later, Ingrid Bergman presented Hitch with the key at his AFI salute. It sounds like a wonderfully emotional scene. I realize that buying the rights may have been prohibitive. I only wish it could have been included.
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Summary: Criterion's Highest Technical Quality?
Review: When I discoved that Hitchcock's wonderful classic, Notorious had been transferred to dvd, I immediately bought a copy - distributed by Anchor Bay. This copy however, had a few problems - skips within the movie, as if someone bumped the machine while the movie was recording, being one of them. One thing that I can say about the Anchor Bay version is, the beautiful GRAINLESS transfer, with rich deep blacks, and pristine whites, and NO DUST BUNNIES! I returned my Anchor Bay copy, and anxiously awaited the Criterion release of my favorite movie. This 'dual-layered' disc was not worth the wait. The Criterion verison is very grainy, with many, many dust particles throughout the transfer, and there is actual ghosting - where it appears that the negative lifted during copying - in the bungalow scene. Very sloppy work from a studio that prides itself on 'the highest technical quality'. I pre-ordered Rebecca, and I've already imagined the worst. I did keep my Anchor Bay copy of this film, and I'm very tempted to re-order another copy of their Notorious dvd, just to see if maybe I received a bad copy, the first time around. Because even without the Criterion supplements, this transfer is visually superior than Criterion's, and for a fraction of the price. Notorious was the first of three dvd classics, that I've purchased from the Criterion Collection. Aside from the interesting, and informative supplements, the visuals (ALL 3 discs) are the poorest, yet experienced in the dvd format. Are all Criterion transfers so slipshod? Definitely the supplements are not worth the price of a dvd that has MORE GRAIN than a VHS, and endless dust particules - have they ever been introduced to canned air, or negative cleaner? Amazing. Ask Anchor Bay for a 'Notorious Re-Dux', and spend the savings on a second dvd. Buyer Beware - of them all.
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Summary: Very soft around the edges for a Hitchcock movie.
Review: You should know, if you haven't seen this, that it's a love story with an espionage/intelligence background, rather than a suspense movie with romantic elements. Actually the only suspense revolves around whether Bergman & Grant will ever stop bickering and get together permanently. Espionage-wise...the cast and the audience all know from the start that Claude Rains is a neonazi who's up to something, so the only mystery is "specifically what is he up to?" Not that compelling a question. And the intelligence techniques that are used to find out are aimed toward advancing the love story, at the expense of reality--does Bergman really need to marry Rains to find out who goes to his dinner parties? Couldn't the mysterious intelligence agency that recruits her just have posted a guy across the street to take notes? Bergman and Rains are very good, Grant less so (he plays almost a Gene Hackman character), and Hitchcock--with all due respect--has done a lot better.
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