The Trouble with Harry

 

The Trouble with Harry 1955

• Director: Alfred Hitchcock
• Seen by this director: Torn Curtain, Marnie, The Birds, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Psycho, North by Northwest, Vertigo, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Rear Window, Rebecca, Jamaica Inn, The 39 Steps, probably others
• Based on the novel by Jack Trevor Story
• Cast: Edmund Gwenn, John Forsythe, Mildred Natwick, Mildred Dunnock, Jerry Mathers, Royal Dano, Shirley MacLaine
• Personal “oh yeah him/her” reaction, i.e. have seen this actor in:
• John Forsythe – something, I’m sure but I don’t remember
• Mildred Natwick – Barefoot in the Park, Arsenic and Old Lace, various TV series
• Mildred Dunnock – Death of a Salesman, The Nun’s Story
• Jerry Mathers – Leave It to Beaver
• Royal Dano – Many TV series, Moby Dick
• Shirley MacLaine – Downton Abbey, Rumour Has It, In Her Shoes, Postcards from the Edge, Steel Magnolias, Terms of Endearment, Sweet Charity, Gambit, The Yellow Rolls Royce, Around the World in Eighty Days
• Why? Because I remember liking it
• Seen: Once or twice before. Now 25 June 2021.      

       The trouble with Harry isn’t so much that he’s dead as that something must be done with the body. It’s a farce filled with various people believing they killed him, some wanting to bury him, some wanting to dig him up, doing a bit of both and generally running around inanely. A couple of unlikely romances are tossed in for good measure.

       It’s fun to see MacLaine in her first tole but it isn’t much of a film, not nearly as funny as I remember it. It’s clever at times but it’s also juvenile and amateurish. It’s hard to believe it was directed by Hitchcock. 

2 * of 5