Memorable, crazy movie

Good concept, poorly executed.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

American physicist Professor Michael Armstrong (Paul Newman) shocks his assistant/fiancée Sarah (Julie Andrews) when he suddenly and very publicly defects to East Germany. What Sarah doesn't realise is that Michael is part of a covert operation to try and acquire the missing piece to a scientific puzzle that could render nuclear weapons obsolete.A disappointing suspense flick from Alfred Hitchcock, Torn Curtain suffers from a lacklustre script that offers up way too few classic moments (but one or two unintentionally funny ones) and is hampered by a leading couple who share very little chemistry. Worse still, Hitch's direction feels very much like the work of a once great director still desperately trying to impress, but failing, his carefully orchestrated, supposedly exciting set pieces including a yawn-inducing walk through a gallery accompanied only by the sound of footsteps, and an escape by bus that is about as thrilling as catching my local service into town.The finalé, which once again takes place in a theatre (as in Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much versions 1&2), is utterly ridiculous, Newman avoiding capture by shouting 'Fire!', thereby inciting immediate panic in the audience. This is followed by an equally inept scene where our hero and heroine are smuggled out of Germany in costume hampers, only to face possible death at the final hurdle.There is a glimpse of Hitchcock's greatness during the murder of security man Gromek (Wolfgang Kieling), a drawn out death scene that brilliantly illustrates the ugliness of violent death, but this moment only serves to highlight just how frustratingly mediocre the rest of the movie is.

Torn Curtain, in spite of what some may believe, was not a flop. Critically mauled, it did however not fail at the box office. This can most likely be attributed to the fact that it's directed by Alfred Hitchcock and stars Paul Newman and Julie Andrews, three of the biggest names in cinema history.It's a film that isn't as awful as you may have been led to believe, in fact it's a passable Cold War suspenser, but it's just that it's a muted picture on auto pilot, an overlong spy caper encompassing a thematic beat about fidelity and trust. Plot involves defection, double agents, undercover missions and a whole host of shaky spy like shenanigans. However, these things are never developed into a thrilling movie. It exists, and cheekily for a while it holds the interest.Atmosphere is set at bleak, which is in keeping with the atmosphere behind the scenes of the production - casting decisions, fall outs et al - so really it's not a must see movie. There's some merit here, with ironic smarts and genuinely good ideas, it's just that come the 90 minute mark you will be looking at your watch and thinking the big names involved should be producing something a whole lot greater. 5/10

Michael Armstrong (Paul Newman) is a physicist and Sarah Sherman (Julie Andrews) is his assistant/fiancée. The government had rejected his work on an anti-missile defense. They're in Norway for a conference. He tells her that he's going to Stockholm but she finds out that he's actually going to East Berlin. She follows him there. To her shock, he declares that he is defecting to the east once they arrived.Alfred Hitchcock had already achieved greatness when this movie opened. The problem with this movie is that it fails to reach the same heights. This is a rather bland unoriginal espionage movie. It feels like a script from the maybe pile. The dialogue has no sting. There is no shock value. I never bought Armstrong's defection. The long kill of the East German Stasi agent is pretty good but it still lacks realism. It's a run-of-the-mill thriller from somebody who should have done better.

I knew this moment would come, and that I'd eventually find a Hitchcock film that I didn't care for too much. TORN CURTAIN, while certainly topical in its examination of Cold War politics, nuclear secrets and double agents, largely fails to do what every other Hitchcock picture I've seen so far has done, i.e., be entertaining. Granted, there are a few sequences that recall classic Hitch, but they are barely enough to distract from how dull this was to get through at times. In what would be his last usage of "marquee" talent, Paul Newman and Julie Andrews star as a couple of scientists who publicly defect to East Germany at the height of the Cold War in order to gain access to an important formula or nuclear secret. Honestly, as the film's MacGuffin, this piece of information doesn't really matter (to the audience, at least). And that's fine. However, matters aren't helped by having such weak characters despite being capably played such talented actors and Newman and Andrews. Even the chemistry between them was barely better than Connery and Hedren in MARNIE. There was also no memorable villain. Still, at the risk of beating down too much on the film, there were a few sequences that I will probably remember for while. The best of these happens close to halfway in, and involves a tense brawl between Newman and an East German agent who has gotten onto his secret plans. It plays out sans score, and was incredibly tense. Towards the end, there was also a bus-riding sequence and a scene in a theater that recalled the climax to THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH. It wasn't as good as the former, but still stood out. If there's one thing that's sorely missed, it's Bernard Herrmann as composer, here replaced by John Addison. I did like a number of the cues, but I can only imagine that Herrmann's score would have been much better. Even so, I liked the jazz-inflected touch that Addison brought to the material. Ultimately, though, TORN CURTAIN suffers by having terrible pacing and taking too long to really kick into gear. The last 40-45 minutes, minus a pointless semi-comic detour, is able to salvage some of what came before, but the film is still overall kind of boring.