Sabotage (1937)
1h 17m | PG-13
Karl Anton Verloc and his wife own a small cinema in a quiet London suburb where they live seemingly happily. But Mrs. Verloc does not know that her husband has a secret that will affect their relationship and threaten her teenage brother's life.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Studio: Gaumont-British Picture Corporation
Genre: Drama, Thriller, Crime
Video: 720p
Cast
Sylvia Sidney
as Mrs. Verloc
Oskar Homolka
as Karl Verloc - Her Husband
Desmond Tester
as Stevie - Her Young Brother
John Loder
as Ted
Joyce Barbour
as Renee
Matthew Boulton
as Superintendent Talbot
Reviews
Perhaps not one of Hitchcock's most prominent films, but it's a tense crime thriller telling the tale of a family of recent émigrés to Britain who are struggling to run their small London cinema. Oskar Homolka ("Mr. Verloc") falls foul of some criminals who offer to pay him for carrying out an act of sabotage. This doesn't quite cause the mayhem they desire so he is unwittingly, this time, involved a much more deadly action. Unbeknown to him, Scotland Yard are on to them and have planted a detective (John Loder) in the greengrocers who befriends the family. The plot unfolds slowly and tensely. Loder and ("Mrs. Verloc") a slightly dewy-eyed Sylvia Sidney fall for each other as we go along. That storyline slightly districts from the suspense and the ending comes along a bit too rapidly for me. Great to watch, though...