- The Paradine Case is an odd courtroom drama in which the defense attorney, Anthony Keane (Gregory Peck), falls in love with the glamorous defendant, Mrs. Paradine (Alida Valli). Paradine is under suspicion of having killed her blind husband, but Keane thinks he can hang the murder on their suspicious foreign servant, Latour (Louis Jourdan). In the meantime, Keane's loving wife Gay (Ann Todd) becomes aware of Keane's straying affections and decides, for reasons that possibly only make sense to her alone, that the best outcome would be for Keane to win the case for Paradine. Unfortunately, Keane's eagerness to find a scapegoat for the crime ultimately has dire consequences for everyone, even if he does get his confession in the end.
- Let's face it: Every artist has their medium, and Hitchcock's is not the courtroom drama. Part of the problem, I think, is that it is rather challenging to achieve a real surprise in a trial film. The two possibilities are either that a) the defendant did it or b) the defendant didn't do it. Don't get me wrong, films have gotten a lot of mileage out of these two options, but the simple fact is that a courtroom drama is unlikely to end with a murder, an explosion, or someone falling off of the Statue of Liberty. That said, this particular courtroom drama is not a complete loss. The courtroom itself is beautifully realized, as are many of the shots that seem to constantly circle around the defendant. The film also has Charles Laughton in it, which should count for something. Unfortunately, even his prodigious presence is insufficient to make up for the film's dull pacing and general lack of enthusiasm. Thankfully, Hitchcock would go on to make far better films, and Peck would go on to portray far more convincing (and, for that matter, American) lawyers.
- I spotted Hitchcock walking around with a cello case.
- Keane's room at the inn was number seventeen, which may have been an inside joke.
