The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Set in Paris in 1482, this adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel centres on Esmeralda, a young Romani dancer who enters the city and draws the attention of several very different men. Among them are Frollo, the king's chief justice, the soldier Phoebus and the poet Gringoire. Quasimodo, the deformed bell-ringer of Notre Dame, lives an isolated life in the cathedral's heights as Frollo's ward, until his devotion to Esmeralda puts him in conflict with his guardian's intentions toward her. When she is accused and seeks sanctuary in the cathedral, Quasimodo becomes her protector.

William Dieterle directed the film, working from a screenplay by Sonya Levien, with Pandro S. Berman producing for RKO Radio Pictures. It followed several earlier Dieterle pictures, including A Midsummer Night's Dream and Another Dawn, in a directorial career that had begun in the late 1920s. Charles Laughton plays Quasimodo, with Cedric Hardwicke as Frollo, Maureen O'Hara as Esmeralda, Thomas Mitchell as Clopin and Edmond O'Brien as Gringoire.

The production cost two million dollars and took seven million at the worldwide box office, a substantial return on its budget. On IMDb it holds a rating of 7.8 from more than twelve thousand votes, while on TMDB its rating is 7.3 from a much smaller number of votes. A critics' rating of 8.6 from seventeen reviews places it above both audience scores. Running 117 minutes, the film was released in August 1939.