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Review

A star rating of 2 out of 5.

Released shortly after the TV drama The Girl, in which canonised director Alfred Hitchcock is portrayed as little more than a sadistic lech, this more agreeably comic portrayal acts as a salve, if little else. Under a mound of make-up, Anthony Hopkins gleefully plays the man as a stubborn, lugubriously wisecracking old teddy bear whose worst crimes are overeating and petty jealousy. But the film runs no deeper than that. Screenwriter John McLaughlin is surer on the making of Psycho - Hitch's belligerent reaction to the success of North by Northwest, self-financed because of studio disinterest and an unhelpful censor - than the unconvincing love triangle also involving Mrs Hitchcock, Alma Reville (a miscast Helen Mirren), and Strangers on a Train adapter Whitfield Cook (Danny Huston). Sacha Gervasi, making his narrative directorial debut after rockumentary Anvil: the Story of Anvil, struggles to bind the two strands to a misjudged fantasy element in which real-life serial killer Ed Gein becomes Hitchcock's ghoulish confidant. Despite amusing moments and a sprinkling of catnip for film buffs, Hitchcock is disappointingly inconsequential.

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Credits

Cast

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Alfred HitchcockAnthony Hopkins
Alma RevilleHelen Mirren
Janet LeighScarlett Johansson
Peggy RobertsonToni Collette
Whitfield CookDanny Huston
Vera MilesJessica Biel
Lew WassermanMichael Stuhlbarg
Anthony PerkinsJames D'Arcy
Ed GeinMichael Wincott
Geoffrey ShurlockKurtwood Smith
Joe StefanoRalph Macchio
Barney BalabanRichard Portnow
Saul BassWallace Langham
Bernard HerrmannPaul Schackman
Martin BalsamRichard Chassler

Crew

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DirectorSacha Gervasi

Details

Theatrical distributor
20th Century Fox
Released on
2013-02-08
Languages
English
Guidance
Swearing
Available on
DVD and Blu-ray
Formats
Colour
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