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Notorious
Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious. Ingrid Bergman plays Alicia Huberman, who goes to hell in a handbasket after her father, an accused WWII traitor, commits suicide. American secret agent Devlin (Cary Grant) is ordered to enlist the libidinous Alicia’s aid in trapping Alexander Sebastian (Claude Rains), the head of a Brazilian neo-Nazi group. Openly contemptuous of Alicia despite her loyalty to the American cause, Devlin calmly instructs her to woo and wed Sebastian, so that that good guys will have an inside woman to monitor the Nazi chieftain’s activities. It is only after Alicia and Sebastian are married that Devlin admits to himself that he’s fallen in love with her. The MacGuffin in this case is a cache of uranium ore, hidden somewhere on Sebastian’s estate. Upon discovering that his wife is a spy, Sebastian balks at eliminating her until ordered to do so by his virago of a mother (Madame Konstantin). Tension mounts to a fever pitch as Devlin, a day late and several dollars short, strives to rescue Alicia from Sebastian’s homicidal designs. Notorious remains one of Hitchcock’s best espionage melodramas. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
$19.95 $17.76 now at The Video Collection
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