Wonkette Movie Night: Suspicion
'I think I'm falling in love with you, and I don't quite like it.'
We had a wonderful Wonkmeet today in Cleveland and there are pictures to come. (I am assuming it was fan-fucking-tastic as I wrote this on Friday. But it is an easy assumption to make.)
Suspicion was based on the novel Before the Fact, written by Francis Iles (nom de plume of Anthony Berkeley Cox) in 1932. The original ending of the movie was much darker as it followed the book closely and was more of what Hitchcock wanted the film to be, but that was rejected by the studios to protect Cary Grant’s image.
Grant’s character Johnnie is an attractive playboy charmer who causes high society women to swoon. He could also be described as a toxic, misogynistic con man with almost no redeeming features besides a great smile. He engages in negging, which isn’t surprising that it goes back to 1941, it has been around forever; they just didn’t always call it that. Robyn has helped us understand the world of garbage men like Johnnie before.
Lina McLaidlaw is still drawn to Johnnie, probably because he looks and sounds like Cary Grant, even though she fears he may have made an attempt to kill her on their first date. Despite her doubt and suspicions, Lina still falls for him; if there is one thing that Johnnie is truly a master at, it is manipulation.
Will Lina uncover Johnnie’s deceptions or will there be some wild twist? I have a suspicion it will be both. It is an Alfred Hitchcock movie after all.
Much entertainment has come from that bit of paranoia called suspicion, in movies, TV, and music. Elvis wrote the song “Suspicion” that was a hit for Terry Stafford, although Elvis had a hit with “Suspicious Minds” written by Mark James.
Suspicion is available for $3.99 in the usual places. Free on the Internet Archive.
Suspicion stars Joan Fontaine, Cary Grant, Auriol Lee, Cedric Hardwicke, Nondas Metcalf, Carol Curtis-Brown, Nigel Bruce, and May Whitty. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock.
To make requests and see the movie lists and schedules go to WonkMovie.
The animated short is No Offense by Kris Borghs in 2023. From the YouTube description:
“No Offense was created in response to the attack on Ali Farzat, a Syrian cartoonist whose hands were broken because of his critical portrayal of his president. While Kris Borghs was writing, designing and animating this film, other creators were less lucky: a Russian had to flee his country for painting Putin in lingerie, a French cartoonist was put on trial for insulting the pope, North Korea threatened war over a Kim Jong-Un persiflage and the tragic raid on Charlie Hebdo took the level of violence against artists to a terrifying new level. This clever and witty animation purposely questions the limitations on political free speech and creative expression in societies across the world.”
These limitations are battles that artists have long fought and will continue to fight.
“A Pulitzer winner quits 'Washington Post' after a cartoon on Bezos is killed” — NPR
“Political cartoonist says he was laid off over his illustration of Trump golfing near dead migrants” — CBS News
Our next Movie Night selection is The Incredibles, available with subscription on Disney+, $3.99 in the usual places.
𝐁𝐎𝐍𝐔𝐒 𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐕𝐈𝐀:
In interviews, Alfred Hitchcock said that an RKO executive ordered that all scenes in which Cary Grant appeared menacing be excised from the movie. When the cutting was completed, the movie ran for only fifty-five minutes. The scenes were later restored, Hitchcock said, because he shot each piece of film so that there was only one way to edit them together properly. This is a technique called 'in-camera editing', a trick Hitchcock had already employed a year before during filming of Rebecca (1940), to prevent producer David O. Selznick from interfering with the final cut of the movie.
Wonkmeet pics! https://substack.com/@ziggywiggy/note/c-146141992?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=2knfuc
https://substack.com/@ziggywiggy/note/c-146276353?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=2knfuc