Watch Murder! For Free

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

disgusting, overrated, pointless

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

The print used by studio canal in their box set with a death mask of Hitchcock - has dropouts in which the screen goes BLACK. I mean come on its 2017. ...................political correctness ..... no killer can be gay...or has black blood.......... or whatever?.......... its an old movie LEAVE IT ALONE!!! <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Right after Handell Fane departs for good a SCENE IS CUT. When the body is brought by on a stretcher a man says "Neck Broken" then a lot of people milling about ......... a man in charge gives an envelope to Sir John written by the dead man. Says: "I don't know if this means anything..." all this is CUT. all you see is Sir John reading the contents of the letter to Markham. ITS NOT THEIR JOB to reedit movies. Especially ones from box sets with the mans death mask. Its a tribute! Don't tribute the man by trashing his work. i bought the set for one movie. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Way back in time - go back .... back to the days when the vcr was first invented... in 1979 Alfred Hitchcock Died. On PBS across the United States was a showing of several of his films from Archival Prints in BFI. by special arrangement with PBS: Secret Agent 1936, Champagne 1928 and MURDER 1930. I recorded these and watched them dozens of times. They were in perfect condition NOT AT ALL like the bastardized version of MURDER put out by Studio-Canal. There is a scene where they go from Sir John's Office lunch to Markham's Room in which the film is "Burnt"! I assure you on that 1979 showing the film was not burnt. I still have SECRET AGENT on tape from 1979. It has Never been on TV since then. I lost Champagne & Murder unfortunately moving around. Studio-Canal needs to get the BFI Print which is complete and perfect. I DO NOT CARE what the reason is to show a burnt movie but by 2017 it should be replaced. The killer is queer or No he's not queer he just wears women's clothes - No he wears Police Costumes - No he's got black blood. - No he's just a normal killer who don't want to get caught and will wear any disguise. He could have 6 girlfriends - He's a killer So no reason to burn a film. Stop Now and try to buy a DVD of MURDER without the burnt scene. Go ahead! Now do it!

On a noisy evening, beautiful British stage player Norah Baring (as Diana Baring) is found with the bludgeoned body of a rival actress and a bloody fireplace poker. After a short investigation, Ms. Baring is charged with murdering the other woman. However, the accused can't recall a thing she did, and nearly admits guilt on the witness stand. Actor, playwright, producer and juror Herbert Marshall (as John Menier) thinks Baring may not have committed the crime. Calling the defendant "pretty," Mr. Marshall sets out to prove the attractive young woman did not commit "Murder!" Obviously very well-versed, Marshall mentions Agatha Christie's "The Mousetrap" and quotes Shakespeare. "The play's the thing" (from "Hamlet"), he believes will help identify the real killer. Marshall decides to write a story about the murderer and engage suspects in the role...This early "talkie" is most notable for being directed by Alfred Hitchcock, eventually acclaimed as one of the 20th century's greatest filmmakers. After a nice (tracking) opening, Mr. Hitchcock gets a little cluttered and almost loses the fact that there is a murder victim somewhere near the bottom of the screen. However, this being Hitchcock, we do get a good look at tea and women's underwear. There is more experimentation here than in some of the master's other early films – which should interest the academic viewer. It's fun to see him developing skills. In one of the supporting roles, Esme Percy (as Handel Fane) stands out. He plays an actor who assumes both masculine and feminine roles into adulthood, due to a high-pitched voice. He's also seen on the flying trapeze in a circus act. Moreover, the character is apparently bisexual. That's versatility! ***** Murder! (7/31/30) Alfred Hitchcock ~ Herbert Marshall, Norah Baring, Esme Percy, Edward Chapman

Of Hitchcock's early talkie films, Murder! is not as good as Blackmail and The Lodger but it is an improvement on Juno and the Paycock. It is an interesting film, particularly for Hitchcock completists, but it is a long way from one of his best. Murder! is very well shot and photographed, and Hitchcock directs splendidly with some tautness, subtle humour and a great deal of atmosphere. The lighting is very fitting to the tone of the story and the costumes and sets are beautifully evoked. The music is haunting and never too much or little, the use of the Tristan and Isolde prelude was also a nice touch. Of individual scenes coming off best were the thrilling beginning courtroom sequence and the suspenseful climax. Herbert Marshall is very good in the lead role. Apart from Marshall though the acting does come across as too stagy, Nora Baring and Esme Percy are particularly prone to it, but Marshall is the only actor who doesn't come across as on the stagy side. Aside the beginning and end, the story didn't come across as involving. A lot of it is rather dull and lacking in suspense, for a Hitchcockian whodunit with the wrong man theme that was somewhat odd and disappointing. The script has flashes of intelligence especially at the beginning but is tonally disjointed and lacks life in much of the film. And as a few have mentioned the voices and the way the actors speak are very heavily clipped and accented(even for a Hitchcock early talkie), so it is not always easy to understand what is being said. All in all, an interesting film but not a great one. 6/10 Bethany Cox

This is a brilliant early work by Alfred Hitchcock, a film full of ingenuity and originality, and showing unmistakable signs of Hitchcock's developing genius. It stars Herbert Marshall, in one of his finest performances as the conscience-stricken character Sir John Menier, a famous stage actor who serves as a juror for the trial of a woman named Diana Baring, who is accused of murder. Strangely enough, Diana Baring is played by a well-known British actress of the time called Norah Baring. Despite being a double-Baring, she does not bare anything but her own polite doubts and hesitancies, being so highly bred that she dare not even be so presumptuous as to try to defend herself. Norah Baring has that high wavering voice, exceedingly thin figure, and shy, saintly manner of the born victim. Such women were fashionable in England in the 1930s. They spoke like overgrown children, with the most perfect diction. Considering how over-mannered and feeble most English men were at that time, perhaps such victim-women were all they could cope with. When the story begins, Baring is found sitting in a kind of trance in front of a fire where a girl who was her friend lies dead, with a poker beside her covered in blood. She continues to sit there looking straight ahead of her in a daze while the police come in and investigate the crime scene in an oafish and clumsy manner, getting their own fingerprints all over everything and acting like the proverbial Mr. Plod. They ask her what happened and she says she cannot remember anything. So this is an excellent start to a jolly good Hitchcock drama. Baring is convicted of murder and due to hang. Marshall had held out against a bullying jury until he finally caved in and agreed to a guilty verdict. But then he had juror's remorse and set about actively trying to prove her innocence before she could be executed. His investigations become more and more complicated, and Baring is unwilling to help him, and in any case genuinely cannot remember what happened. Apparently, Baring thinks it is only good manners to submit to the verdict. If she ever had an ego, it had certainly drained out of her long ago, like rainwater going down a street culvert. Can Marshall possibly accomplish anything against all these odds? He is determined and indomitable. A most fascinating understated and inspired performance is given by Esme Percy, as the ambiguous character Handel Fane, who is both an actor and a trapeze artist who likes to dress in drag. In an understated performance laden with unspoken implications, Percy gives the character all the poignant underpinnings of a man tormented by his own contradictory impulses, and weighed down by the loneliness of his cross-dressing compulsion. It is an amazing psychological study of an extreme character type. Percy certainly was underrated in his career and his excellent interpretation of this difficult character helps make the entire film a true classic.