Loading...
London. A mysterious serial killer brutally murders young blond women by stalking them in the night fog. One foggy, sinister night, a young man who claims his name is Jonathan Drew arrives at the guest house run by the Bunting family and rents a room.
The film established Alfred Hitchcock's reputation as a director and was hailed by a trade journal as potentially the finest British production made at the time.
Ivor Novello
The Lodger Jonathan Drew
Marie Ault
Mrs. Bunting the Landlady
Arthur Chesney
Mr. Bunting
June Tripp
Daisy Bunting
Malcolm Keen
Joe Chandler
Reginald Gardiner
Dancer at Ball (uncredited)
Eve Gray
Showgirl Victim (uncredited)
Alfred Hitchcock
Man in Newspaper Office (uncredited)
Alma Reville
Woman Listening to Wireless (uncredited)
Due to lead actor Ivor Novello's publicity, the script had to be changed to ensure his character was unequivocally innocent, preventing him from being portrayed as the villain.
A unique scene depicts the lodger pacing on a transparent ceiling, achieved by filming him walking on a thick sheet of toughened glass from below.
Upon viewing the finished film, producer Michael Balcon was reportedly furious and nearly shelved it, requiring film critic Ivor Montagu to be hired to salvage it.
Alfred Hitchcock, despite having directed two prior films, later referred to The Lodger as his first true 'Hitchcock film'.
The Lodger established Hitchcock's reputation as a director and helped shape the modern thriller genre in film.
0 reviews
Avg: 0.0 / 5
Variety
Hitchcock is a director with an exceptionally acute ear. He achieves his results by a Ravel-like rhythmic pummelling of the nervous system. Music, sound effects, the various equivalents of squeaking shoes, deep breathing, disembodied voices are mingled in the telling of the tale with a mounting accumulation of small descriptive touches that pyramid the tension.
Donald Spoto, biographer of Hitchcock
The first time Hitchcock has revealed his psychological attraction to the association between sex and murder, between ecstasy and death. Montagu's claim that Hitchcock's edit contained up to 500 intertitles seems likely an exaggeration, but he worked with the director during the summer months to tighten up the film. One of the other improvements was to hire American poster artist Edward McKnight Kauffer to design the animated triangular title cards.
Bioscope
The trade journal suggested the film could be the finest British production ever made, indicating extremely high praise.
Loading reviews...
