The Man Who Knew Too Much
Short description
A British couple, Bob and Jill Lawrence, are vacationing in the Swiss Alps with their daughter Betty when they become friendly with a Frenchman, Louis Bernard. During their stay he is fatally shot, and before dying he manages to pass on a warning about an assassination plot. The people behind the conspiracy then kidnap Betty, using her as leverage to force her parents into silence. The couple must try to rescue their child while also preventing the planned attack on a foreign dignitary in London.
Alfred Hitchcock directed this 1934 British mystery thriller, the sixth of the forty-three films in his directing career, following Murder! and preceding The 39 Steps. Charles Bennett and D.B. Wyndham-Lewis wrote the screenplay, and Michael Balcon produced it for Gaumont-British Picture Corporation. Leslie Banks and Edna Best play the parents, with Peter Lorre as Abbott, Frank Vosper, Hugh Wakefield and Nova Pilbeam as Betty among a credited cast of thirty-three.
The film runs seventy-six minutes. On IMDb it holds 6.7 out of 10 from around 23,000 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 6.5 from roughly 469 votes. A critics' rating of 7.8 from thirty-three reviews places it above both audience scores, indicating stronger professional regard than general viewer response.
What's left behind the scenes
- Peter Lorre, of Hungarian origin, who had previously filmed in Germany, knew English very poorly at the time and memorized almost all of his lines by ear, not always understanding the meaning of his dialogue.
- The film begins with a scene in St. Moritz, Switzerland – it was at this resort that Hitchcock spent his honeymoon with his wife.
- The film is based on a real event known as the Siege of Sidney Street – in 1910, a group of Latvian anarchists took refuge in a house and fired upon the besieging police. Since the British police did not have weapons at the time, they had to call in the army for assistance. Winston Churchill, who then headed the police department, personally oversaw the operation.
- A Hitchcock cameo – a man in a raincoat crossing the street (before Bob and Clive enter the chapel; around the 33rd minute of the film).
- Studio filming took place at Lime Grove Studios.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
