Blackmail

Blackmail, 1929

UK, DCP, Black & White, 84’, English

Cast: Anny Ondra, John Longden, Cyril Ritchard

With live musical accompaniment by John Sweeney

Hitchcock’s silent Blackmail is one of the best British films made in 1929, during the transition to the sound era; it was commissioned as both silent and part talkie with music and some dialogue scenes. Alice White is in love with the Scotland Yard detective Frank Webber. On a date night with the detective,sheditches him and secretly arranges a meeting with another man. Later that night Alice agrees to go back to his flat to see his studio but the man has other plans for her. From its opening sequence with the police tracking down a wanted criminal, through scenes on the London Underground, the film successfully escapes from its theatrical origins.