Notorious (1946)

Genre: Drama/Romance/Crime

Starring: Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains, Leopoldine Konstantin

Set against the end of World War II, the American government is trying to trace various Nazi loyalists spread around the world and closely monitor their activities. One such loyalist, Alexander Sebastian (Rains) has been located in Brazil and has come under the American governments radar for his business dealings and friend circle. The government decides to recruit Alicia Huberman (Bergman) to become an undercover agent and gain entry into Alex's life. Alicia's father and Alex were very good friends and Alicia's father was recently tried and sentenced to prison by an American court. An American agent, Mr. Devlin (Grant) convinces her take the assignment and flirt with Alex and try to extract and share as much information as possible. Devlin falls in love with Alicia but he realises that she has an assignment to do. Alicia too loves Devlin but is not sure of his feelings and does not know what to do with this new assignment that she is due to take up. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock, the movie comes typically from his style of movies and nicely blends romance and drama with the story of an undercover spy. The movie's beginnings and the eventual build up of the excitement factor is slow and weak and is not all the gripping to keep your eyes glued on the screen for every passing second. It's not that the movie isn't well made, but it somehow lacks the charm that a Hitchcock movie should have.

Thumbs up: Fabulous performances, brilliant blend of opposite genres

Thumbs down: Lacks excitement and suspense

Rating: 6.9/10