Lifeboat

1944 Hitchcock movie

Rating: 16/20

Plot: A black guy, a nerdy guy, a guy who likes dancing, a guy who doesn't like to wear a shirt, a snobbish socialite, a young woman, and maybe a couple people I've forgotten about survive the sinking of their ship. Tension mounts when they pick up one of the Germans who torpedoed their ship. They debate what to do with their "prisoner" but soon realize they may have to rely on his expertise to save them from their predicament.

I was skimming a trivia page for Lifeboat and came across this nugget: Members of the crew noticed that Tallulah Bankhead was performing sans underwear and brought the issue to Uncle Alfred's attention. Hitchcock answered, probably while chewing on marbles, "I don't know if this is a matter for the costume department, makeup, or hairdressing." I told my wife this, and she asked (with that scrunched-up face she makes some times), "Are you putting that in the blog?" I said, "Of course!" She suggested I start writing cleaner and "get rid of the randiness." So that brings us to the first shane-movies poll of 2011! Please leave your answer(s) in the comments. Do you:

A) want less randiness
B) want a lot less randiness
C) want more randiness
D) want a whole lot more randiness, randiness of Mary Poppins proportions!
E) want nothing but randiness
F) want no randiness at all
G) want the exact same amount of randiness
H) want the same amount of randiness but desire some diversity in the randiness
I) have no problems with randiness as long as it's not too gross or read too close to dinner time
J) have problems even remembering any shane-movies randiness in previous entries
K) have no problem with randiness as long as it's in an entry about randy old Uncle Alfred's movies
L) just want me to write about the movies and not go on and on about randiness
M) want this to be the randiest blog in the history of the Internet
N) think I should start having give-aways like some blogs my wife reads


Quick note: Two movies in a row to start this year with a compound word for a title. Although I'm not sure Timecrimes is a real word.

The movie? Well, John Steinbeck wrote it, based on Hitchcock's idea, and Hitchcock directed it. For a 40's movie that takes place entirely in a boat (Hitchcock experimenting again with a one-setting movie), it sure manages to seem realistic. I like that Hitchcock wasn't afraid to take a tense situation and throw in some comic moments. There are a lot of characters for one lifeboat, and I wish they could have been developed more. This is the type of movie that forces the viewer to put themselves in the situation of its characters and imagine making the same choices though, and it is a story more about the situation than the individuals involved. I really liked Walter Slezak as the enigmatic German, always calculating and with motivations that don't entirely make sense to me. Odd ending, one that made me wonder if Hitchcock was messing with me. Speaking of the director, you've got to look close for his trademark cameo, but it's a clever one.