#885: HITCHCOCK, Alfred: The Lodger: A Story Of The London Fog (1927)

HITCHCOCK, Alfred (United Kingdom)
The Lodger: A Story Of The London Fog [1927]
Spine #885
DVD


With his third feature film, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, Alfred Hitchcock took a major step toward greatness and made what he would come to consider his true directorial debut. This haunting silent thriller tells the tale of a mysterious young man (matinee idol Ivor Novello) who takes up residence at a London boardinghouse just as a killer known as the Avenger descends upon the city, preying on blonde women. The film is animated by the palpable energy of a young stylist at play, decisively establishing the director's formal and thematic obsessions. In this release, The Lodger is accompanied by Downhill, another silent from 1927 that explores Hitchcock's "wrong man" trope, also headlined by Novello — making for a double feature that reveals the master of the macabre as he was just coming nto his own.

90 minutes
Tinted/Black & White
Silent
1:33:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2017
Director/Writers


From the novel by Marie Belloc Lowndes.
Screenplay by Eliot Stannard.

A

Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

The Booklet

Eight-page foldout featuring essays on The Lodger and Downhill by critic Philip Kemp.

Commentary

None.

2K digital restoration

With a new score by composer Neil Brand, performed by the Orchestra of Saint Paul’s.

Another 1927 feature

Directed by Hitchcock — Downhill — starring Novello, in a 2K digital restoration and with a new piano score by Brand.

Interview 1

With film scholar William Rothman on Hitchcock’s visual signatures.

Video essay

By art historian Steven Jacobs about Hitchcock’s use of architecture.

Excerpts

From audio interviews with Hitchcock by filmmakers François Truffaut (1962) and Peter Bogdanovich (1963 and 1972).

Radio adaptation

Of The Lodger from 1940, directed by Hitchcock.

Interview 2

With Brand on composing for silent film.

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

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