The Lady Vanishes

One of the things, movies can do so well is play with our expectations, it's so interesting as a viewer to not know what's going to happen yet. This is one of the reasons why Alfred Hitchcock is considered such a master of cinema, he toys with our emotions, sending a plot in one direction, when we thought it was going another. "The Lady Vanishes", one of Hitchcock's early masterpieces and surely one of his most purely entertaining films is an exercise on playing with our expectations.

"The Lady Vanishes" opens with a very light touch, it takes place in an over crowded hotel in Europe where we get the chance to meet all the major players of the film. At the beginning, we really aren't even sure who the main character is, or who the lady the title refers to is. The most prominent characters in the beginning are two British cricket fans (Nauten Wayne and Basil Radford) who are worried about missing the upcoming tournament. These men in fact are minor, but provide the best comic relief. There is also a man and a woman posing as a married couple but are carrying on a secret affair (Cecil Parker and Linden Travers). Finally we meet the romantic leads, they are Iris (Margaret Lockwood) and Gilbert (Michael Redgrave). Their story starts off as more or less a romantic comedy, he annoys her to no end, yet you realize the first moment they meet that they will fall in love.

There is also Miss Froy (Dame May Whitty) a sweet natured elderly women who Iris meets on the train back to Britain. Miss Froy is indeed the woman eluded to in the title, when she suddenly for no reason she becomes missing with Iris falls asleep. Throughout the majority of the rest of the movie, Iris is convinced Miss Froy is on the train, yet no one seems to have any recollection she is there. Gilbert of course helps her out, even though he is skeptical at first as well.

Other characters are introduced on the train as well, and Hitchcock was a master at casting people with villainous or treacherous faces, throughout Iris' search, we know something isn't quite right, yet it's hard to put our finger on it. Before the train, Miss Froy is seen outside her hotel room listening to a singer from outside her window, but the singer is seen killed, later, before the train, an attempt on her life is made. We are meant to feel what Iris feels while she is searching the train, we the audience have seen Miss Froy, yet everyone else is saying we haven't. Iris is accused by a doctor (Paul Lukas) that she is delusional, and we also feel it with her, Hitchcock plays with this sense of uncertainty for as long as he can, almost until we can't take it anymore, when will he answer this burning question?

"The Lady Vanishes" was made at the height of Hitchcock's success in England, two years after this film, he would go on to Hollywood and make "Rebecca", and the rest as they say is history. People have often argued that Hitchcock lost some of his charm when he left England, and his films were mostly about craft. I can understand what they mean, yet I disagree with them, his British films do have a certain sensibility, at times they are more playful and there is always that kind of wit you don't see in the American films, yet that is something I think Hitchcock always brought with him no matter what nation he worked under. Hitchcock might've grown stale in Britain, and Hollywood seemed to be suited more for his kind of storytelling, and it's a good thing too, since he pretty much changed the way American films were made afterwards.

"The Lady Vanishes" however remains terrific entertainment, it's the type of film Hitchcock made so well, blending genres such as comedy, mystery, and suspense so well, it actually does keep you guessing. "The Lady Vanishes" actually wasn't always the first film I thought of when I thought of Hitchcock, yet when I watch it again and again, it becomes more and more delightful, it depicts a master right before he would conquer the film world.