Number 17

I've often seen, and used myself, phrases like "tug of war" or "at war with itself" to describe a movie where elements of it seem to be in conflict with one another. The acting doesn't match the script's tone, or the tone and pacing are off, and so on. I have not seen a movie that lives up to that concept more than Number Seventeen. The backstory of the production is more interesting than the story of the movie. The movie's story is thus: eight people all converge upon one empty house in England. There are two things in this house: a stolen diamond necklace, and passage to a railroad that will take them to the European continent (by way of a ferry). Some of the people in the house are thieves; someone is a police detective; almost all of them are lying about something. Knowing the backstory, though, makes a lot of the filmmaking decisions make sense. Alfred Hitchcock returned from a vacation with an idea for a new movie and told his friend, who was the co-founder of British International Pictures, the studio Hitchcock was contracted to. Unfortunately for Hitch, he learned a studio exec had a different idea for Hitch's next movie, an adaptation of a stage play called Number Seventeen. Even though Hitchcock expressed his distaste for the story, AND another director entirely expressed interest in directing Seventeen, Hitch got stuck with the job. In later years, Hitchcock would call the film "a disaster", and it is often ranked very low among the director's filmography. As you can see, I won't go that low ... but I do see its faults. The two primary issues upon which every other minor issue is built upon are the direction and the script, with the direction probably being the worse of the two. Remember how I mentioned the movie being at war with itself? You can see it best illustrated in the contrast between two scenes: the opening few minutes, and the fistfight between two characters about 2/3's of the way through. The former follow a man walking into the house, using candlelight to inspect the floors, while a hobo is also in the house. On the second floor landing, a body is discovered; the hobo tries to flee, but falls down the stairs. This whole sequence is shot (seemingly) using nothing but natural candlelight. Shadows dance and flicker, and the angles used exaggerate the size and shape of the shadows and the item casting them. It sets up this beautiful, gothic, creepy atmosphere that the movie never even tries to achieve again, and is among some of the most visually striking sequences Hitchcock ever shot. Contrast that to the fistfight. It is choreographed with the enthusiasm of "well, if I have to"; it appears more like the actors were filmed with their fists already on the cheeks of the other and pulled their arms back, and then the film was shown in reverse. Everything is slow and clumsy, as if the actors were drunk but still somehow mindful enough to attempt being careful. I can say unequivocally, that it is the phoniest fight I've ever seen, and I watch professional wrestling. But it gets worse, because there are no sound effects whatsoever in this scene. It is played in total silence. If you've never seen a fight play out in silence -- no impact noises, no grunts, no expelling of air, no nothing --, let me tell you it is twice as awkward as you're imagining. This is emblematic of the whole movie. One scene is laid out and photographed with the expertise of Psycho-era Hitchcock, and the next feels very much like what it is: a man making a movie against his will, and putting the minimum necessary effort into it to get it done and out the door. Then, you bring in the script. I'm not kidding when I say of the eight principal cast members, seven of them lie at one point or another about who they are, some crucial aspect of themselves, or their motivations. That means the movie is constantly throwing twists at the viewer, literally until the last minute. There is a way to pull off multiple twists in a movie; Number Seventeen's method seems to be a shotgun blast, which is the opposite of what needed to be done here. By the time this movie's scant 61 minute run time was over, I was exhausted with the lies and double-crosses and revelations. That run time doesn't help matters either. I don't know if Hitchcock made it super-short so he'd had to shoot less movie or what, but the effect of a super-short movie piled to the rafters with twists and double-backs is too much story stuffed into too small a movie. There isn't a moment to breathe in this movie; it has no time to spare to let a scene or a development settle. It has to run to the next one. The rapid-fire pacing does mean the movie has a constant feeling of progression and excitement, but because it's white-knuckling the whole thing, nothing makes an impact. It whizzes by, like scenery on the freeway. Critics of the time called the movie convoluted and incomprehensible; I don't agree in principle, but I also have the luxury of a pause button and commercial breaks on Plex. Another knock-on effect of the movie thinking it has to qualify for Daytona is the tone; the writer/star insisted it was meant to be a comedy, but it's about as funny as picking out socks. But it isn't a thriller either; it moves too fast to let thrills set in. And it isn't hard-boiled enough to be a noir. It leaves the movie in an odd space where it is what it is, but saying what it is is impossible. It's just ... Number Seventeen. While I went into great detail there about the movie's issues, that isn't to say it didn't entertain me, Despite needing a flow chart for following the plot, and the pacing trying to break the sound barrier, and the overall filmmaking ranging from masterful to backyard, it's still entertaining in a weird way. Its awkward genre formlessness allows it to stand on its own. The actors are trying their hardest. Ann Casson was the stand-out for me, playing the young, spunky, takes-no-crap Rose. There is fun to be had here, and at 61 minutes, it's hardly a deep investment of time anyway. I'm sure once my tour through Hitchcock's filmography is done, it won't be in the top half, but I don't think it deserves the "disaster" label either.