The Man Who Knew Too Much

Hitchcock thrillers are rarely wound tighter than the terrific 1956 smash THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH.

Reuniting with his frequent leading man Jimmy Stewart, Hitch opens the film with Indiana doctor Ben McKenna, his wife, famed actress and singer Jo McKenna (Doris Day) and son Hank on a tourist bus in North Africa.

When Hanks accidentally breaks foreign customs, a Frenchman named Louis Bernard (Daniel Gelin) steps in and rescues them from potential violence.

The McKennas agree to meet Bernard for dinner that evening. When Bernard abruptly cancels those plans and then ends up dying in the doctor's hands the following day, the American family spins deeper and deeper into a political assassination plot.

When Hank is kidnapped to keep them silent on what the doctor knows, the parents have to weigh their silence against their search for their son.

Stewart and Day are great together and Hitchcock/Stewart had made so many great films together by 1957 that they effortlessly team up to create Hitch's perfect "everyman" foil to drop into the international danger.

There are many classic scenes within, including the marketplace murder with the doctor staring hopelessly down at his darkened hands, the dark humor-filled confrontation at the Taxidermy shop, the tense scenes in the Abbey, but Hitch saves the best for last.

The action climaxes in a dialogue-free, tension filled showdown in Royal Albert Hall in London.

Hitch fills the soundtrack with a live performance with full orchestra and chorus, unwinding the event in real time against a music piece that you already know will conclude with an assassination in the hall.

You even know exactly WHEN it will occur thanks to Hitchcock and the terrific screenplay by John Michael Hayes, who also wrote "Rear Window" and "To Catch a Thief" for the director.

For 12 minutes, Hitchcock reveals the action without any spoken words, dropping the parents into the concert hall separately, the assassin and his target into their boxes and then slowly winding up the tension until it's shattered by a single scream.

It's one of Hitchcock's best set pieces in a career full of them and only gets better with repeat viewings.

Hitch's favorite composer Bernard Herrman crafts a great score and appears as the conductor in the climax.

Obscure actor Reggie Nalder gets extra points for a very creepy portrayal of Rein, the assassin. Nalder has an unusually haunting and gaunt face that you might recognize (if you're in your 50's anyway) from his guest spots on "Star Trek", "Thriller" and "The Man From UNCLE". He's downright haunting in his key role here.

This was a remake of the director's 1934 film of the same name, fleshed out and updated to the late 50's political arena.

THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH delivers the same tension and thrills it did when it hit theatres 60 years ago, earns a suspense-filled A+ and a spot in my all-time Top 100 films.