Torn Curtain (1966)

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

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

Torn Curtain (1966) ** 1/2 (out of 4) American professor Michael Armstrong (Paul Newman) goes on a vacation where he plans on dumping his fiancé Sarah Sherman (Julie Andrews) so that he can attend to business. The fiancé ends up following him and she's shocked and horrified to see them end up in Germany behind the Iron Curtain. Soon the woman begins to fear that her fiancé has sold out America and plans on helping Germany.Alfred Hitchcock apparently hated making this film and hated being forced to use Newman and Andrews. The film isn't nearly as bad as the legendary director made it out to be, although there's no doubt that it's not a classic by any stretch of the imagination. As for Hitchcock's hatred, I'm going to guess he spoke even worse about the film simply because the studio didn't give him the cast he wanted.As far as the film goes, it's pretty entertaining and I think Hitchcock was wrong when he criticized the two lead performers. Yes, I think both Newman and Andrews are quite good here and they're certainly believable as the couple behind the Iron Curtain trying to find a way out. I thought Newman was very believable in the role of the scientist and I think Andrews does good during her more emotional scenes. Lila Kedrova, Hansjorg Felmy and Wolfgang Kieling are also very good in their supporting roles.The film also benefits from some nice cinematography and a good music score. As for the flaws, there's no question that the story itself really isn't anything fresh or original. In fact, the spy genre was at full force during this era due to the James Bond movies so TORN CURTAIN does feel a tad bit old fashioned and its story just seems like something that would have been better twenty years earlier. Also the 128 minute running time is a bit too long. With that said, the cast is good and there are some nice suspense scenes so TORN CURTAIN is still worth watching.

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.

In the 1960's the tensions of the Cold War ensured that the spy genre was at the height of its popularity both in films and on TV. After the financial failure of Marnie (1964), Alfred Hitchcock chose to play it safer and moved away from the complex psychological aspects of that film and into the more populist, less ambiguous spy thriller territory with his next two films Torn Curtain and Topaz (1969). Unfortunately, the decision did not pay off, as both of those were equally as unsuccessful at the box office as the darker, less straightforward Marnie. For me, Marnie is easily the best of Hitchcock's three 60's box office bombs but of the two spy thrillers, Torn Curtain is superior to Topaz. It's less flabby and more concise, yet both films share a similar characteristic where they begin very well but lose their way somewhat in their final third. With Torn Curtain, the initial set-up is somewhat intriguing and paced very well; it also includes a classic Hitchcock scene where a man and a woman kill a communist security agent in a farmhouse in a particularly protracted an messy fashion, going against cinematic norms and illustrating the sheer difficulty of killing someone. But psychological edginess is eventually disregarded and the plot essentially mutates into a chase movie which is a bit of a let-down considering the potential that has been put in place in the set-up.Its story has an American nuclear physicist defect to East Germany but finds his situation complicated when his fiancé follows him. This one is also typified by featuring two actual mega-stars of its day in Paul Newman and Julie Andrews. It has to be said though that neither of them seem to be at their best here and their performances almost feel a bit forced. Seemingly Hitchcock did not work well with method actor Newman and this clash of styles could be at least partially responsible for the uneasy feeling on-screen. Torn Curtain is hardly a disaster though as it does contain some great moments and benefits from a very polished look. And in fairness, even though it is somewhat routine, it's no less so that a few of Hitchcock's earlier more lauded thrillers. I do feel though that this director is at his best when he is working with material with more psychological edginess, as opposed to the more straightforward suspense embodied in Torn Curtain. It's a solid but unspectacular affair.