1942 - SABOTEUR, very good 40's Hitchcock spy thriller.

Hitchcock revisits some of the same plot situations and themes from his British classic The 39 Steps.

Hitchcock was unhappy with Saboteur.  He felt that he didn't work out the story and the film turned into a bunch of set pieces.  Hitchcock was also disappointed with the main leads of the films, Robert Cummings and Priscilla Lane, two actors who he thought weren't sufficiently charismatic enough to carry his film. 

60 years later Saboteur looks pretty damn good as a film.  This is an extremely well made and acted film and has lots of Hitchcock's humor and his very clever way setting up a suspense sequence. 

If the film lacks a strong story line and is mostly a lot of elaborate set pieces, these set pieces are excellent pieces of filmmaking, combining Hithcock's skill directing them, along with the technical  ability and expertise that Hollywood crews could bring to a production.

I would certainly not rate this as a lesser effort on Hitchcock's part, it's a much better film than Rebecca, Spellbound or Suspicion.

108 minutes, written by Peter Viertel, Joan Harrison and Dorothy Parker.