starring Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains
directed by Alfred Hitchcock
103 minutes
Alicia Huberman (Ingrid Bergman), daughter of a convicted traitor and Nazi sympathizer, is recruited by Devlin (Cary Grant), a federal agent, to help spy on men who are suspected of having helped the Nazi cause during World War 2 and now live in Brazil. Alicia has no experience when it comes to espionage. She is recruited mainly because of her familial connection to the Nazis.
Alicia and Devlin fall in love before she is given her first assignment, to get close to Alex Sebastian (Claude Rains), an associate of her father. The assignment messes with Alicia and Devlin's budding relationship. She winds up marrying Alex but she continues to pass information to Devlin. Alex eventually figures out what is going on but he's in a bit of a bind and worries what would happen to him if his Nazi associates discovered that Alicia has been spying on him for the US government.
The beginning of the movie felt a bit forced. Once I learned to accept that Alicia and Devlin were in love but had trouble reconciling that with their working relationship, the movie felt much richer. An extra layer is added on to that when they pretend that they are in love to prevent Alex from discovering what they are really doing. The angst that Alex experiences, when he discovers that Alicia doesn't really love him and has been spying on him, also adds a layer to the story and puts him in precarious situation. It is all so deliciously complicated.
What an ending! It's hard to feel pity for Alex considering which side he chose in World War 2 and what he did to Alicia after he discovered the truth about her. It is also hard not to feel something given the situation he is in when the story ends.
Claude Rains was nominated for an Academy Award for his Best Supporting Actor performance but lost to Harold Russell who won for playing Petty Officer 2nd Class Homer Parrish in The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). Ben Hecht, who wrote the screenplay, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay but did not win.
I saw this movie once before. I don't recall exactly when but it was probably 30 to 40 years ago. I don't recall being quite as impressed with it then as I was this time around. I don't think that I could have appreciated the complexity of the relationships in this movie 30 to 40 years ago. I didn't really recall very much from the first time I saw it.
Notorious is solidly good. I enjoyed it very much although it grew on me slowly. The full effect of the movie didn't hit me until the closing minutes.
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