Always trouble with Harry
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Always trouble with Harry |
| Original title | The Trouble with Harry |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1955 |
| length | 99 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Alfred Hitchcock |
| script | John Michael Hayes |
| production | Alfred Hitchcock for Paramount Pictures |
| music |
Bernard Herrmann Raymond Scott |
| camera | Robert Burks |
| cut | Alma Macrorie |
| occupation | |
| |
Always Trouble with Harry (original title The Trouble with Harry ) is an American comedy film that was filmed in 1955 by Alfred Hitchcock based on a novel by Jack Trevor Story and is characterized by the black humor typical of Hitchcock . The film is about how a corpse worries the inhabitants of a small village because they fear that they have something to do with it. In the main roles are played by Edmund Gwenn , John Forsythe , Mildred Natwick and Shirley MacLaine in her film debut. The film is one of Hitchcock's few comedies.
action
A sunny autumn day in a small village in the American state of Vermont . When the weather is nice, several of the quirky villagers are out and about in the forest and one after the other, independently of one another, they meet a dead man lying on a hill at the edge of the forest, whose identity turns out to be "Harry" based on a letter found on him. For various reasons, none of the villagers is interested in the police finding out about the deceased person: the retired captain and hobby hunter Albert Wiles imagines that he accidentally shot Harry; old-boy Ivy Gravely fears that she killed Harry with her walking stick to ward off his attempts to harass her; Harry's wife, Jennifer Rogers, who is separated from him, believes she gave him a fatal blow on the forehead with a milk bottle. The previously unsuccessful painter Sam Marlowe wants to help and get to know Jennifer, with whom he falls in love during the film.
The people mentioned work together but are indecisive in their actions as new circumstances keep arising. When Albert finds out, for example, that he couldn't have shot Harry, he digs him up again. When Sam becomes engaged to Jennifer, he is afraid that he might be suspected of having jealously cleared Harry out of the way. The corpse is dug in and out several times. Albert and Ivy also get closer to each other, and she even invites him to dinner with blueberry pie. In a subplot of the film, Sam finally finds a buyer for his paintings in a millionaire. The humorless deputy deputy Calvin Wiggs, who is paid according to the number of his arrests, comes dangerously close to the quartet. He finds a drawing by Sam, on which the corpse Harry - of whose existence he knows from a tramp - is shown.
Ultimately, by chance, the local doctor comes to the rescue, who - when he knows of Harry's existence - determines a heart attack as the cause of death. The four wash Harry, who is completely dirty from the excavations, and put him in his old place. Then they let Jennifer's son (Arnie) discover him, because he turns the days tomorrow, today and yesterday. The trouble with Harry is over.
backgrounds
Pre-production
Always Trouble with Harry is Alfred Hitchcock's third film for Paramount Pictures after The Window to the Courtyard and Above the Roofs of Nice . He had read the novel The Trouble with Harry by the English author Jack Trevor Story , published in 1949, four years earlier and recognized its potential as a "black comedy" even then. This contradicted the advice of an expert who had advised against filming the story because the humor was too weak and the story too unrealistic and poor. Paramount Pictures was also rather critical of the success of the project, but then approved a budget of one million US dollars because of Hitchcock's two previous film successes. John Michael Hayes ' script , his third for Hitchcock in a row, was long since finished when Hitchcock was able to secure the film rights through a middleman for only $ 11,000.
script
Hitchcock built various sexual innuendos into the dialogues, which at first glance were absolutely harmless, for example Albert mentions Ivy that you have to open the can to see what's inside. The allusion is clearer when Sam asks Jennifer right at the beginning of their acquaintance if he could paint a nude of her. Since the regulations of the Hays Code still applied at that time, such sentences were rather unusual and daring on the cinema screen.
Trouble with Harry is always due to the dead man, who is only a problem for everyone and whom no one mourns, interspersed with dry, morbid English humor. This was not very common in the USA, but it was hoped that it would be a success with the public. Hitchcock himself called the film the most English of his American films and, in retrospect, counted it among his favorite productions. Although macabre humor has appeared in many other Hitchcock films, this film is one of the few where black humor prevails over crime thriller.
occupation
The film did without a really famous star in the cast, also because the budget didn't allow it. The 77-year-old Oscar winner Edmund Gwenn is mentioned as the first actor in the opening credits, making him the oldest actor to ever take on a leading role for Hitchcock. He previously starred in the films Bis zum Messer (1931), Waltzes from Vienna (1934) and The Foreign Correspondent (1941) under Hitchcock's direction. After Cary Grant was too expensive and William Holden had another engagement, the lesser-known western actor John Forsythe - with whom he worked again on Topas in 1969 - was signed by Hitchcock. He had convinced Hitchcock at a stage appearance, whereupon Hitchcock came to him afterwards and offered the role. Mildred Natwick as Miss Gravely was a distinguished film and television actress, but this was almost the only leading role in her film career.
For Shirley MacLaine , the role of Jennifer Rogers was her first film role, which she only came across by chance. Herbert Coleman saw the performance of the new musical The Pajama Game in New York City, where he was to examine suitable stage actors on behalf of Hitchcock, and was impressed by the leading actress. To Coleman's surprise, she was only the understudy. The just 20 year old Shirley MacLaine was able to start a world career in this way through fortunate circumstances. The fact that she had to play the mother of a six-year-old boy (played by Jerry Mathers ) didn't bother anyone and is not noticed in the film.
Philip Truex (1911-2008), a son of Hollywood actor Ernest Truex, served as the corpse . Philip Truex was initially euphoric about being allowed to play the title role in a Hitchcock film, but then disappointed when he learned that he would only be seen as a corpse in all scenes. That served as a sign to Truex that his acting career was as dead as Harry, and he then turned to gardening full time.
production
Hitchcock chose autumn Vermont for the exterior shots. The village of Craftsbury in Orleans County , Vermont served in autumn 1954 as a film location. The picturesque place had around 700 inhabitants at that time. Cloudy weather, later even rains and storms, however, ensured that some of the intended recordings literally fell into the water. The team went to a gym in Vermont, and later even to the Paramount studio in Hollywood. There an attempt was made to save as much of the atmosphere as possible by using previously rotated background shots for rear projections and, in addition, by picking up tons of fallen colored leaves and sticking them to gypsum trees in the studio. The shoot in the studio with the glued-on sheets particularly affected the scenes in which Harry is buried and dug up. Mainly because of this, the budget was exceeded by $ 200,000 to $ 1.2 million.
For cameraman Robert Burks it was the sixth film with Hitchcock. The film was shot in Technicolor .
During the shooting, the expressionist artist John Ferren (1905-1970) was also present, who painted the works of Sam in the film and also advised John Forsythe on how he could play a professional painter in a technically credible manner. Hitchcock valued Ferren's work and was convinced that their use of color would go well with the colorful Indian Summer film set. Three years later, Ferren designed the dream sequence at Hitchcock's Vertigo and painted the portrait of Carlotta in the film.
music
Always Trouble with Harry was the first Hitchcock film for which Bernard Herrmann wrote the music. The collaboration between the two then lasted around ten years, during which time Herrmann was responsible for the music of all Hitchcock films. This resulted in famous compositions for Psycho and Vertigo - From the Realm of the Dead , but Hitchcock called the music of Immer Ärger mit Harry his favorite Herrmann composition, as it had perfectly captured the bizarre black humor of the plot. In 1998 Herrmann's film music, recorded by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra under the direction of Joel McNeely , was re-released on CD.
The song Flaggin 'the Train to Tuscaloosa , which John Forsythe sings in the film, was written by Raymond Scott .
Cameo
Alfred Hitchcock appeared in extras in many of his films, including this one. When the millionaire's car, who later bought Sam's pictures, stops in the town for the first time, Hitchcock walks behind the car as a passer-by. See also Hitchcock's cameos .
synchronization
The first German synchronization was created in 1956 by Berliner Synchron GmbH. The dialogue book was written by Fritz A. Koeniger and the dialogue was directed by Klaus von Wahl . A second German version was created in 1983 for the revival of the film in 1984. The dialogue book for this version was written by Andreas Pollak and the dialogue was directed by Heinz Petruo .
| role | actor | Voice actor (1956) | Voice actor (1983) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Captain Albert Wiles | Edmund Gwenn | Alfred Haase | Klaus Miedel |
| Sam Marlowe | John Forsythe | Ottokar Runze | Hans-Jürgen Dittberner |
| Jennifer Rogers | Shirley MacLaine | Renate Danz | Susanna Bonaséwicz |
| Miss Ivy Gravely | Mildred Natwick | Ursula War | Christine Gerlach |
| Mrs. Wiggs | Mildred Dunnock | Elf tailors | Renate Danz |
| Arnie Rogers | Jerry Mathers | Andreas Mattishent | |
| Dr. Greenbow | Dwight Marfield | Lothar Blumhagen | |
| Deputy Sheriff Calvin Wiggs | Royal Dano | Helmut Gauss |
reception
Audience reaction
The film was a financial failure in the United States in the fall of 1955. The reasons were assumed that many viewers of Hitchcock expected a crime film, as usual, and that the Americans in particular were not used to the black humor. This was different in Europe, where the film was shown in cinemas in Italy and France for over a year.
In West Germany, as in other European countries, the film was not released until August 14, 1956. Eight years after the premiere, the rights to Always Trouble with Harry , as with three other films made for Paramount, fell under contract to Hitchcock. They should be part of his daughter's inheritance. For this reason, these films were not shown for a long time and only came back to the cinema in the mid-1980s and then also on television. The first broadcast on German television was on December 2, 1973 on ARD .
Similar variations of the theme were made with Always Trouble with Bernie in 1989 and Girls' Night Out in 2017 .
reception
At the time of publication there was some criticism of the macabre humor, but overall most of the reviews were friendly. After the film was out of theaters, the film rights were returned to Hitchcock and his family, and the film was next to not shown for 30 years. The film rights to Always Trouble with Harry , like Cocktail for a Corpse (1948), The Window to the Courtyard (1954), The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956) and Vertigo - From the Realm of the Dead (1957) were part of the legacy to his daughter Patricia . It wasn't until 1984 that the five films were shown again.
Always Trouble with Harry has received mostly good reviews to this day, even if they don't quite come close to the excellent reviews of some of Hitchcock's other films. There has been a tendency for film reviews to become more and more positive in the recent past. In 2012 , Peter Bradshaw even saw the film in The Guardian as a long-forgotten "surrealist masterpiece" by Hitchcock. On the US criticism portal Rotten Tomatoes , Always Trouble with Harry received a positive rating of 90%, based on 22 reviews.
“Detective comedy that lives mainly from the tension between the macabre events and the cheerful, idyllic narrative gesture. An enjoyable cabinet piece in the art of understatement and black humor that surprises again and again with grotesque twists. "
“American 'shivering joke' by Alfred Hitchcock - a macabre game with a corpse that thrives on sarcasms , grotesque turns of phrase and cynical surprises. Too tactless for us. "
“The comedy is based on understatement. One speaks of a corpse as of misplaced glasses. These nice, sympathetic people, who immorally and unscrupulously handle a dead body, throw it into the bathtub, drag it around by the feet, and always only look at everything from a pragmatic perspective, are the most lovingly drawn people, which, perhaps apart from Shadow of a doubt , can be found in Hitchcock. All of his sympathy belongs to you, the little people beyond the big, exciting world events. They don't strive for the jewels, the money and the power that always causes disasters in all other films. Sometimes they are simply too old, sometimes they just don't care. "
“The macabre humor typical of Hitchcock's homeland comes from the understatement, because Harry causes trouble because he is dead and just doesn't want to be buried. The machinations of his bereaved relatives are ironically counterpointed by Bernard Hermann's soundtrack. "
Awards
Shirley MacLaine received the Golden Globe Award for Best Young Actress for her first film role . Alfred Hitchcock was nominated for the Directors Guild of America Award, the film and MacLaine for Best Foreign Actress received nominations for the British Film Academy Award .
DVD release
- Always trouble with Harry. Universal 2003, contains extensive extras, including a making of .
Soundtrack
- Bernard Herrmann : The Trouble With Harry. The Complete Motion Picture Soundtrack. Varèse Sarabande / Colosseum, Nuremberg 1998, sound carrier no. VSD-5971 - Digital re-recording of the full score by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra under the direction of Joel McNeely
literature
- Jack Trevor Story: The Trouble with Harry. T. V. Boardman, London and New York 1949 (so far no German translation).
- Robert A. Harris, Michael S. Lasky, eds. Joe Hembus: Alfred Hitchcock and his films (OT: The Films of Alfred Hitchcock ). Citadel film book from Goldmann, Munich 1976, ISBN 3-442-10201-4 .
- John Russel Taylor: The Hitchcock Biography. Fischer Cinema 1982, ISBN 3-596-23680-0 .
- Bodo Fründt: Alfred Hitchcock and his films. Heyne Film Library Volume 91, 1986, ISBN 3-453-86091-8 .
Web links
- The Trouble with Harry in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The Trouble with Harry at Rotten Tomatoes (English)
- Criticism from Ulrich Behrens in the film headquarters
Individual evidence
- ^ Certificate of Release for Forever Trouble with Harry . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , December 2008 (PDF; test number: 10 992 DVD).
- ↑ Documentation: "The Trouble with Harry Isn't Over" (2001), 3rd minute
- ↑ Documentation: "The Trouble with Harry Isn't Over" (2001), 7th minute
- ↑ Documentation: "The Trouble with Harry Isn't Over" (2001), 6th minute
- ↑ imdb.com
- ^ Philip Truex (IMDb). Retrieved December 18, 2018 .
- ↑ Documentation: "The Trouble with Harry Isn't Over" (2001), 14th minute
- ↑ Susan Felleman: RealObjects in Unreal Situations: Modern Art in Fiction Films . Intellect Books, 2015, ISBN 978-1-78320-250-8 ( google.de [accessed December 17, 2018]).
- ↑ Documentation: "The Trouble with Harry Isn't Over" (2001), 22nd minute
- ^ The Trouble with Harry (VSD 5971, 1998) - The Alfred Hitchcock Wiki. Retrieved December 18, 2018 .
- ↑ a b Thomas Bräutigam : Stars and their German voices. Lexicon of voice actors . Schüren-Verlag GmbH, Marburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-89472-627-0 , p. 342.
- ↑ Always trouble with Harry in the German dubbing file (dubbing actor of the cinema version)
- ↑ Always trouble with Harry in the German dubbing index (dubbing actor of the re-performance)
- ↑ Documentation: "The Trouble with Harry Isn't Over" (2001), 27th minute
- ^ Peter Bradshaw: The Trouble With Harry: Hitchcock's lost masterpiece . In: The Guardian . July 2, 2012, ISSN 0261-3077 ( theguardian.com [accessed December 17, 2018]).
- ^ The Trouble with Harry. Retrieved December 17, 2018 .
- ↑ Always having trouble with Harry. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed November 20, 2016 .
- ↑ 6000 films. Critical notes from the cinema years 1945 to 1958. Handbook V of the Catholic film criticism. Düsseldorf: Altenberg 3rd ed. 1963. p. 211.
- ↑ Short review on Critic.de