Customer Reviews

The Lady Vanishes (The Criterion Collection)

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This 1937 comic thriller is one of the first great masterpieces of Alfred Hitchcock. Based on Ethel Lina White's novel, THE WHEEL SPINS, it mixes laughs and chills better than just about any other film, before or since. A nervous bride-to-be (beautiful Margaret Lockwood) meets a sweet elderly woman (the magnificent Dame May Whitty) on a train bound through Europe to London just before WWII. Also aboard: a roguish musicologist (Michael Redgrave), a pair of adulterers (Cecil Parker and Linden Travers), a smooth German doctor (Paul Lukas), two delightfully fussy cricket fans (Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne), and a mysterious nun (Catherine Lacy) wearing sexy high heels under her habit. When the old lady disappears from the moving train, the young heroine investigates, and everyone else aboard insists that she is mistaken--there never was any old lady....

I can think of no higher tribute to Hitchcock than the fact that so many recent hit films are virtual remakes of his classic gems. DISTURBIA is REAR WINDOW recast with modern teens, and the 2005 Jodie Foster thriller, FLIGHTPLAN, was an unofficial remake of THE LADY VANISHES with an airliner standing in for the train--right down to the famous "fingerprint on the window." Why do modern filmmakers keep imitating the Master's films? See for yourself. This new, 2-disc reissue from Criterion has a lot of extras and a newly remastered print of the film itself. It's a must for fans and newcomers alike. Highly Recommended.

THE LADY VANISHES - new Criterion DVD - is a notable improvement in sharpness and contrast over Criterion's previous edition. Even if you have the old one, the new edition is worth the upgrade. If you are new to pre-American Hitchcock, this film is your best introduction. If you are inclined to purchase a cheaper version of the same film, be warned: any public domain editions are distinctly inferior.

Criterion has just released the new 2-disc transfer of 1938's "The Lady Vanishes", Alfred Hitchcock's last great British effort; filmed just before he was swallowed-up by David O. Selznick and Hollywood. Just before the war, the beautiful young Iris(Margaret Lockwood), traveling across Europe by train, meets the governess Miss Froy(Dame May Whitty), a charming old spinster, who promptly disappears into thin air. In fact, no one even recalls having seen the old lady aboard the train. Iris turns sleuth, and soon finds herself drawn into a complex murder-mystery and robust adventure. The fictitous country where most of the story takes place is named in the movie by Miss Froy in her first scene: "Bandrika is one of Europe's few undiscovered corners". "The Lady Vanishes" is a love story, two daffy, English gents, and two car-loads of Nazi's, all tossed together in a quick-witted, devilish comic thriller. Droll English humor keeps the proceedings moving along. In one scene, Iris complains: "Hello, Boris? Miss Henderson speaking. Look, someone upstairs is playing musical chairs with an elephant. Move one of them out, will you? I want to get some sleep". A remarkable cast includes Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lucas, and Dame May Whitty. As the redoubtable Miss Froy, Whitty easily steals the entire film. The final sequence is just short of perfect. Dame May Whitty died at age 82 from cancer in Beverly Hills, shortly after her scenes in the movie "The Sign of the Ram(1948)". She once said, "I've got everything Betty Grable has...only I've had it longer". Modestly budgeted, "The Lady Vanishes" was shot on studio stages, and relied on miniatures, rear-projection, stock footage, transparencies, and one ninety-foot-long railroad set. The real meat of the film is it's nimble acting and dynamic screenplay. There's a lot to chew on here. Criterion released "The Lady Vanishes" in 1998 with less results; it suffered poor video and sound drop-out. There is one drop-out at 18 minutes into the film, but otherwise you have a high-quality transfer. This new high-definition digital transfer was taken from a 35 mm composite fine-grain master positive, and audio restoration has reduced clicks, pops, and hiss. Extras include audio commentary by Bruce Eder(a little dry), "Crook's Tour", a 1941 feature with Basil Radford and Nuanton Wayne reprising their roles from "The Lady Vanishes", Francois Truffaut's 1962 interview with Alfred Hitchcock, a new video essay by scholar Leonard Leff, an essay by critic Geoffrey O'Brien, photos, and art. Alfred Hitchcock made 37 cameo appearances in his films(from 1926 to 1976). 90 minutes into "The Lady Vanishes", you can see him walking along the platform of London's Victoria Station, wearing a black coat and puffing on a cigarette. Alfred Hitchcock changed the way movies are made; both long ago, and right up until the end. We're so glad he did.

First: Bravo Criterion for bringing a wonderful film to the peak of beauty with this Blu-Ray release! I am a huge Hitchcock fan and I wish that more of his films would be restored by Criterion. They do such a great job and include so many extra features!

Well, if you own this film already, perhaps a Blu-Ray purchase of $25+ might not be worth it, but you should at least rent it (my local library has it!) or try and get it from Netflix. The picture quality is stunning. This is such a visual film, despite the shots taking place mostly in narrow train corridors. There is a lot of detail that really comes through in this release.

As for the film, I think this is among Hitchcock's better releases. There is a large and very good cast of mostly underrated and unknown actors and actresses. A few of these actors went on to star in other films, but we don't have the Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Grace Kelly A-list reel here.

The film begins in a remote Inn located in a fictitious Baltic country. Things start off comically enough, and we are introduced to the cast in very fun and interesting ways. Just before boarding the train in the morning, things start to get weird. Without delving too much into the film and ruining the amazing surprise, the main character befriends an elderly British lady who suddenly vanishes on the train. We see that she is either crazy and imagined it, or that there is some kind of conspiracy. A very interesting story unravels and the viewer is in for quite a treat.

There are a ton of extra features, and this is a huge bonus because this is one of Hitchcock's earlier works and helped establish his authenticity as an artistic genius. This was made a couple of years before he filmed 'Rebecca' which would go on to establish him as a Hollywood icon. Ironically, Rebecca was his first American film. Also ironic is that Hitchcock would not receive a best director academy award for Rebecca, which would win best picture. In an amazing career spanning decades, he never won an academy award for directing. Despite this, I rank Rebecca and Vertigo among the best films ever made. So you can understand the importance I am giving to this earlier work as one of the first true glimpses into his coming future success.

This is required viewing for Hitchcock fans, but it is a wonderful film that I think deserves at least a viewing by most classic film fans. They really don't make them like this anymore!

* - DOUBLE DISC-SET INCLUDES
* - New, restored high-definition digital transfer
* - Audio commentary by film historian Bruce Eder
* - Crook's Tour, a 1941 feature-length Charters and Caldicott adventure, available for the first time on home video, starring Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne reprising their beloved The Lady Vanishes roles
* - Excerpts from François Truffaut's legendary 1962 audio interview with Alfred Hitchcock
* - Mystery Train, a new video essay about Hitchcock and The Lady Vanishes by Hitchcock scholar Leonard Leff
* - Stills gallery of behind-the-scenes photos and promotional art
* - PLUS: New essays by critic Geoffrey O'Brien and Hitchcock scholar Charles Barr

1938
96 minutes
Black and White
1.33:1
Dolby Digital Mono 1.0
Not Anamorphic
English

Alfred Hitchcock wasn't too good at straight-out comedy, which he only did once that I can remember. But he was absolutely brilliant at clever, witty thrillers -- mystery with a comic edge. One of the earliest he created was "The Lady Vanishes." While it has some major plot holes, Hitchcock makes up for those with witty dialogue and solid acting.

Iris (Margaret Lockwood) is having a last girl's-night-out with her best friends, at a small Alpine hotel, only days before her wedding to a stuffy arisocrat. As she's leaving on the train, she befriends a kindly little old governess (Dame May Whitty) -- who vanishes while Iris is napping. Even worse, everyone denies that the old lady existed, making Iris wonder if she imagined the whole thing (due to a blow on the head).

She enlists the help of eccentric musician Gilbert (Michael Redgrave) to help her find the old lady, once they are both convinced that the lady existed and that all the people who deny she was there are lying. Now the pair must go through the train in search of the woman -- but they never expected to uncover an international conspiracy and a bevy of German spies.

"The Lady Vanishes" was a pretty early movie of Hitchcock's, and at the end we're left wondering about several oddities in the plot (how is an eighty-year-old lady so athletic? How inept can those foreign agents BE?). As a spy thriller, it's enjoyable but too riddled with plot holes... but it's very good as a comedic mystery.

Hitchcock takes his time introducing us to these characters, by having them all bunk at one overcrowded hotel, and sprinkles it with clues that all is not as idyllic as it seems. One particularly funny scene has Gilbert invading Iris's suite, after she has him ejected from his room, and strewing his things all over as she orders him to leave. But Hitchcock also captures the claustrophobic feeling of being menaced on a train, with no way out.

As well as the feisty socialite and weird musician, the movie is sprinkled with cricket-obsessed Brits, ebullient hoteliers, sweet rambling old ladies, and bickering adulterous lovers. They all do fairly solid jobs, with Redgrave as a charming, slightly odd standout who keeps people awake with folk-dances, and gets all the best lines ("My father always taught me, never desert a lady in trouble. He even carried that as far as marrying Mother.")

"The Lady Vanishes" has actually been put out by Criterion before, but it was so unsatisfactory that I was better off with my cheap little Diamond edition. Presumably if they're releasing it a second time, then they've cleaned it up as even a minor Hitch movie deserves.

"The Lady Vanishes" is a comedic mystery that doesn't quite work as a spy thriller, but is taut, entertaining and amusing enough to keep you watching to the end. Definitely a keeper.

I asked the following question in a comment to an earlier post but received no response:

"The version shown on Turner a few years ago suffered from heavy-handed application of noise suppressors, a common problem in classic film restoration. In particular, the Turner version of this title had significantly clipped speech (the noise suppressors accelerate the natural decline in volume when a word is spoken, especially that of sibilants, making the words sound unnaturally abrupt and sometimes difficult to understand). It also suffered from significant "pumping" of background sounds where the volume of the background rises and falls depending on the volume of the foreground. An obvious example in the Turner print is the sound of the railroad tracks which rises noticeably while people are talking and falls significantly when they're not, the result of the noise suppressors kicking in. Could you comment on whether the Criterion print used noise suppressors more intelligently than the person who prepared the print that Turner used?"

I have recently had a chance to view this Criterion offering so I can now answer my own question: The audio is excellent and far superior to the mangled audio of the version that AMC and Turner played in times past. Speech is not clipped and, therefore, is understandable, sibilants are present, whispers can actually be heard, and there is no pumping of background sounds; in particular, the sound of the railroad tracks remains constant and is not affected by the presence or absence of speech or other foreground sounds. Very surprising was the fact that the actual noise level was rather low despite the near absence of noise suppressor side effects.

Personally, I much prefer an unmuddled sound track to the negative impact of noise suppressors and I've often thought that noise suppression should be a function of playback equipment rather than being hard-coded into the source. That way, each listener can adjust the suppression to his or her liking and his or her tolerance for the negative by-products of the suppression process.

At any rate, Criterion did an excellent job with this release: it's as pleasurable to the ear as to the eye.

I own the DVD of this, but the Blu-Ray update is AMAZING!!

It is totally worth buying the same exact DVD over again with all the same features but to see it picture itself clearer and
sharper.

WOW--it is AMAZING.

This review is for the newer 2007 Criterion Collection edition of "The Lady Vanishes".

I've been a fan of Hitchcock films since I was a kid but never spent much time watching the early films he made while in England. The quality of most of the films was very poor and it made it hard to enjoy (let alone clearly see or hear!) them. So I'd seen "The Lady Vanishes" and liked it but never appreciated it as much as Hitch's later, better-preserved films. I am SO glad I bought this newer Criterion version. It is AMAZING! I adore Criterion; I'm so glad they're out there, restoring old classics like this. I just received my copy and it was like watching the film for the first time. The film quality isn't perfect, but it's 99.9%. It's almost like watching a whole new movie. I can understand all the dialogue which really enhances the story. And now I can see clearly just how handsome Michael Redgrave (Gilbert) was. :o) I'm really glad I made this purchase and gave the movie another chance. I just ordered the second Criterion edition of "The 39 Steps" today and I'm guessing it will also become a new favorite like "The Lady" has. Highly recommended!

The 39 Steps (Criterion Collection Spine #56)

"The Lady Vanishes", in my eyes, is the penultimate work of director Alfred Hitchcock. While most will argue "North by Northwest", "Vertigo" or even "Rear Window", this film - the last of his British - remains a stronger entry. The strength of the characters, the vast unknown as you travel on this train, the small (yet important) clues, the comedy of Caldicott and Charters; all of these merely scratch the surface of what "The Lady Vanishes" represents. It demonstrated that even with a small budget, a relative unknown cast, and a strong macguffin; that no special effects were needed. Money is not the solve-all for Hollywood. As films are released today, big effects and big budgets, nothing can compete with the power of a strong story. Hitchcock was aware of this, and thus, "The Lady Vanishes" was born. Criterion has included it, with a plethora of special features, in their growing collection, and for me - it stays as one of my favorite films of all time. Like a jigsaw puzzle, Hitch gives you only small piece by small piece, not even telling you which lady is going to "vanish", and with each viewing - the suspense grows deeper and stronger. As with most Hitchcock, it is not just about what happens in front of the screen (the introduction of the characters, the scenery, the time), but also what happens behind. It is this discovery which allows future viewings of "The Lady Vanishes" and proves Hitch's cinematic worth.

As I sat down to write this review, draft after draft was tossed out because I wasn't sure what to discuss on a film that has been dissected by some of the biggest film critics (Geoffrey O'Brien, Charles Barr, Robin Barr) and discussed by another great film maestro, François Truffaut. What could I say that hadn't been said before (also ranked #235 of the Internet Movie Database's Top 250 Films), so why not pick three scenes and discuss why they impacted my decision to name this one of my top 10 favorites ... a tough list to be on - especially today. So, here are the three moments in "The Lady Vanishes" that confirmed its honorarium in the Criterion collection as well as the accolades that Hitch has received for this body of work alone.

The first scene has to be the brief introduction of our characters in the small inn. Upon first viewing, there was no indication which of the multiple ladies would not be the one "vanishing", nor was there any direct way of knowing how these groups of different individuals would eventually come together on one train. Just sitting there, waiting for the avalanche to be cleared, we see adulterers, comedians, cricketers, wealthy Americans, musicians, and a little old lady who would eventually be at the crux of all this madness. It is this unknown upon first viewing, the sweetness with the second viewing, and the complexity of the third viewing that makes this nearly opening scene one that cannot be shaken from the mind. Hitch presents you with the early "who" of the film, but without that sense of direction, the darkness allows your mind to discover all possibilities, no matter how many times you watch it. Exactly how many were involved with the plot? Who knows, and that my friends, is only half the fun.

The second scene that stood out in this film was the cult window scene. Without indulging in spoilers, early in the film the window dirt is used as merely a greeting, and later as a divergence from madness. It is during the scene where the name is revealed a second time that always sends tension through my veins. The word in question is just staring at you within the scene, it evokes the need to scream from your couch to look up, to see what we all see, like Hitch is toying with his audience - to say that the beautiful Margaret Lockwood's sanity may not be in question. With merely one word, Hitch has created audience involvement, a level of excitement, and tension beyond belief. It is as if he is flaunting it. It is an iconic scene, but also one of those that speaks for itself. This dirty "word" proved that with a small budget (and no special effects) that you could pull your audiences in deeper. I would challenge any modern film to do the same, alas; I don't think they would have the same result.

Finally, the remaining scene that makes this film more than just print through a projector is actually not a scene at all, but Hitch's involvement of music into this entire film. Yep, it is a broad (and perhaps cheat) third scene, but from the beginning opening scenes a certain tune is flaunted in front of us as maybe just a mere theme music, but as the film continues we learn it is much, much more. Like the name on the window, the missing woman, the confused passengers, the music has a double meaning. It not only represents the mood of the film, but it also sends another message. What is that? Oh, I'm not telling, but Hitch smartly includes it whenever possible. Listen to the scenes, each one, there is a hint of this music throughout - almost including you within the overall story. "The Lady Vanishes" is not just a movie to watch, but also one that should be listened to. The score (if it can be called that) carries nearly more meaning than the characters. That, again, is the power of Alfred Hitchcock.

VIDEO: For everything mentioned above and more, this is a cinematic triumph. The actors are powerful, hilarious, and unique in their respective roles. What Hitch provides is small, yet powerful as he delicately gives us the whole of the story. He has created a film that can be enjoyed over and over despite knowing the ending. The macguffin stands out as not just a plot devise, but also a cult Hitchcock staple.

VISUAL: Criterion has done it again. Their transfer is immaculate. The released this film a while ago (as it is spine #3), but then re-released it about a year ago and this second release is by far the best. The cracks in the frames were cleared, the black and white seemed bolder, and the delivery of the small amount of special effects seemed clear and crisp. Watched on a DVD player that up-converted, this looked and sounded like I was in the theater (maybe even better).

SOUND: This was important in this film, Criterion realized that, and made it as clear as the visuals. The technical aspects of this film were vastly improved and restored to a quality Hitch would appreciate.

EXTRAS: Criterion, as always, has double-whammy-ed you with this double disc. It includes and audio commentary by film historian Bruce Eder, Crook's Tour, a 1941 feature-length Charters and Caldicott adventure, available for the first time on home video, starring Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne reprising their beloved The Lady Vanishes roles. Not to mention excerpts from François Truffaut's legendary 1962 audio interview with Alfred Hitchcock and Mystery Train, a new video essay about Hitchcock and The Lady Vanishes by Hitchcock scholar Leonard Leff. If you aren't saying "WOW", then something is wrong with you.

If you haven't guessed, I love "The Lady Vanishes" not just because it is a great film, but because it best represents Hitchcock's work. There is something for everyone, young audiences and mature cineophiles alike. The characters, the sound, the visuals all blend together to make a phenomenal cinematic journey. Every detail within "The Lady Vanishes" is important - and this is a film that should be watched - again, and again, and again. Impressive.

Grade: ***** out of *****