Suspicion (1941)

By modern standards, the relationship between Cary Grant's Johnny and Joan Fontaine's "Monkeyface" - that's what he calls her - is chilling, not romantic: a wastrel, he binds her in a vicious cycle with her one moment suspecting him of plotting murder and the next feeling floods of relief and love once it's turned out he simply stole from her and lied about it - and Hitchcock plays similar games with his audience, combining moments of comedy (Nigel Bruce's duck calls and Grant's facial expressions and tickles) with murderous chills, referencing the real-life poisoning case of William Palmer as poor Monkeyface traverses that rollercoaster of love and giggles during the highs, and, during the dips, the fear her new husband is going to kill her for her money!

★★★★★

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Saboteur (1942)

Wrongly suspected of a crime, a man goes on the run in Alfred Hitchcock's 1942 thriller, essentially a first-run North By Northwest with its self-satisfied bad guy, its gun-wielding home help, its icy blonde Hitchcock female who gets swept up in the fugitive's plight and slowly thaws and falls in love, and with its final scene featuring a scramble over a national monument - the only thing it doesn't have is North By NorthWest's top tier actors.

★★★★☆

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