Day 15: The Skin Game (1931)

A couple years I decided I was going to watch all of Hitchcock's films in order. Hopefully now with my 365in365 project I'll finally get through the remaining ones. Today, I watched the next one on my list. Hitchcock's 5th talkie - still in Britain at this point, and still shooting in black and white.

This is the most boring/bland Hitchcock film I've ever seen, which is rather surprising, given that it has the most scandalous of all Hitchcock's film's titles.. It's a melodrama, and a poor one at that. The story evovles around two landowners - one of them being a proper landowner, and the other a working-man who made it rich. The working man, Mr. Hornblower, wants to buy some land near that of the gentleman landowner, Mr. Hillcrest, in order to build some factories. The factories would disrupt Hillcrest's view of nature, and so obviously he objects, and a feud begins. How is this suspenseful feud resolved you ask? Well, by blackmail of course! It turns out that Hornblower's daughter-in-law used to help men get divorces by being seen with them, allowing the men to claim they were being unfaithful to their wives. Apparently this is quite disgraceful and distasteful in 1931. The movie is about as exciting as I make it sound.

The only redeeming part of the film is that neither Hillcrest nor Hornblower can be said to be good. They both pursue their actions for their own selfish gains with no concern for others, and as such, there is no clear side to cheer for. This may have been novel in 1931, but the lack of a "hero" in a film is nothing new. The only reason to watch this would so that you could claim you've seen all of Hitchcock's remaining films.