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Load of rubbish!!

Best movie ever!

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

"Young and Innocent" is a fine departure taken by Alfred Hitchcock after a streak of four movies centering on espionage. I must say I had my share of moles, unnamed hostile countries, Scotland Yard investigation, secret agents and all that's about killing, kidnapping and sabotage... and I was glad to watch a Hitchcock film that for once would deal with ordinary people... caught in 'extraordinary' situations. Of course with Hitchcock, watching a film is one thing, but it takes a second viewing to fully appreciate what's there to be appreciated.The film starts with a marital argument, actually a post-divorce one, the husband (George Curzon) is devoured by anger and jealousy and accuses her wife, a well-known actress, of flirting and cheating ever since she became a star, neglecting the man who gave her a leg up. Once again, the camerawork indicates that we're dealing with a master: at the first viewing, I was only listening to the dialogue and boy, I could tell the two were angry, those slaps the husband (sorry, ex-husband) got at the end looked like she meant business. But I was so busy listening that I didn't pay attention to his getting close to the camera just so we could see him nervously twitching his eyes. Later, when he gets outside in the terrace, you see him twitching his eye again, I didn't catch it either. This detail doesn't change much of the experience. When the corpse of the actress is found ashore by Robert (Derrick De Marney), we know, since this is a Hitchcock film, that he's going to take the blame instead of the ex-husband. But it's only when the nervous tic is mentioned that we realize we were dealing with the typical villain with a strong handicap, we also had to see him as a nervous chain-smoker, otherwise, the hint about his behavior would have been too contrived and the clue that lead to him (the matchbox in the pocket) too improbable. Basically, in one opening scene, Hitchcock reveals all we've got to know about the villain, but we see him so early that we're likely to forget about his face, and even that detail does pay off at the end.What we don't forget about him though is that unlike the title "Young and Innocent", he's clearly old and guilty. So when the ill-fated young man runs to bring help, he's spotted by two girls who discover the corpse and scream of terror (love how their scream is 'covered' by the seagulls), we realize that Hitchcock hadn't abandoned all his darlings. His last films featured bad men mistaken for good persons, here we have a honest boy everything accuses, the cause of death is revealed to be strangulation with a trench coat's belt, Robert remembers having his stolen many days ago. A simple belt becomes an accusing piece of evidence just like the brooch in "Frenzy", actually, there's something delightful in Hitchcock's fetishism with small objects of items of clothing that can become dangerous weapons, stockings, rope, ties and belts. The talent of Hitchcock consists of materializing 'screenplay devices' so that viewers can better focus on them, the innocence depends on a belt, the identification of the villain on twitches or a matchbox. There's always a small object or a detail that drives the story. Many examples in this film, after being grilled by the police, Robert faints and then the daughter of the Police Commissioner Erica (Nova Pilbeam) applies her rescuing talents. This is less for the sake of a love at first sight, later the same helping instinct that will make her find to the villain. An incompetent lawyer won't be of any help but not if the hero can take his glasses and slip through the net. Money is important too, in a trivial dinner with her brothers, the geeky one mentions that without money, the fugitive won't go far because of hunger, it's simple but true. At that moment, we recall that he gave all he got to his lawyer and to a pumping attendant, lawyer and we can basically read the same thinking process in Erica's eyes.There's an economy of details but never ineffective because Hitchcock manages to wrap everything and tell a solid story in eighty minutes. The quest to the trench coat has stops by a birthday party where all the nervous excitement depends on their attempts to avoid the treacherous questions of a nosy aunt (Mary Clare) and yet she'll get suspicious enough to get Erica's father (played by sympathetic actor Percy Marmont) on their trail. The second step is the finding of Old Will, a gentle hobo (Edward Rigbu) who's got the trench coat without the belt, all he's got is two clues about the bad guy. Which all leads to an unforgettable climax where the hero is surprisingly absent but that's typical Hitchcock, the plot matters more than the protagonists, especially when the antagonists are more interesting.The film is known for its long crane shot where the camera pans progressively through a hotel ballroom to focus on a drummer. We don't recognize him immediately but we see his twitches. At that point, there's something delightfully thrilling in the way the situation seems hopeless, the Police came to arrest Erica and there's no way Old Will can recognize the man, he's too far away and he's in blackface. But once again, with no words, Hitchcock proves that he can transcend the material of a poor story and puts is in the villain's perspective, someone who committed murder and sees cops coming and circling the place can't feel at ease, no contrivance right here, it makes sense.So many screenwriters are struggling to find the most plausible way to make the big reveal, Hitchcock is just trusting his directing and storytelling methods, it's precisely because the beginning says everything that the ending wraps up the film perfectly. It's not Hitchcock's most known work but it does work!

The Girl Was Young is aka Young and Innocent - the latter seems to be a more appropriate title for this film.The Wiki has this film listed as a thriller - when it is not. IMDb has this film listed as a mystery - when it is not. What it is: A cutesy romantic drama that happened between two people because a man has been falsely accused of a crime and he goes on the run. He bumps into the police Chief Constable's daughter and they start liking each other - she tries to help him as their on screen romance unfold in a sweet, young and innocent way.The movie is not a bad film - but it's not really the crime thriller or mystery it's made out to be. It's tags: Drama, Romance & Crime.5.5/10

Sir Alfred Hitchcock was coming into his own as a film director and genius visionary. Thank God for sound and voices instead of soundtrack. In this film, Nova Pilbeam does a fantastic job as Erica who gets caught up in the murder mystery of actress Christine Clay. The prime suspect suddenly appears to be innocent and wrongly accused of the crime. Erica plays detective despite being young and female. She searches to exonerate the suspected killer. This film may not be one of Hitchcock's classic films but it's fine to watch. I especially enjoyed the scenes with Erica's Aunt (played by the wonderful Mary Clare, a British stage actress). I don't recognize many of the cast members and this film was done in London, England before World War II. This film is fine if you want to view Hitchcock's range of film directing.

If you analyze the Hitchcock films of the pre-"Rebecca" days, you will notice more artistic qualities in them that not entirely disappeared as he became more commercialized in his Hollywood work. While "The Man Who Knew Too Much", "The 39 Steps" and "The Lady Vanishes" are all considered masterpieces, others, like "Sabatoge" and "Young and Innocent", have been neglected, but in further study, are quite influential in many of the technical aspects and different ways of moving the plot forward.For "Young and Innocent", Hitchcock uses a plot line he later altered for 1956's "The Wrong Man" in which a man (Derrick De Marney here) insists he is not guilty of the crime he is accused of, in this case murder. Nova Philbeam is the innocent young woman, the daughter of the local police chief, who reluctantly gets involved in aiding him, and eventually comes to believe in his innocence. There are so many great moments here, especially De Marney's clever escape from the courtroom, the scene in a mine where a car collapses into a sink hole, and the final scene with a big band involved in wrapping up the plot line. Then, there is the shot of Hitchcock, the ham silent actor here, outside the courtroom, that is quite amusing for fans always anxious to find him in his own movies, like an early "Where's Waldo?" puzzle.This is a film of particular interest, not only because of the breathtaking photography, but because of the sly writing which keeps you glued, and the fact that the two stars are not extremely well known actors. This makes their adventures and exploits all the more suspenseful. I've always thought that the British filmmakers had a headway on new methods of the technical art in films, and were sometimes more daring than the American major studios of the time. It is seeing films like this that continue to convince me that this is true, and you can see those influences in American films later on as a "new wave" style took over the screen.