The Trouble with Harry
With Edmund Gwenn, John Forsythe, Mildred Natwick.
US, 1955, 35mm, color, 99 min.
Print source: HFA
In the midst of his dark Fifties’ masterworks Hitchcock found a moment of oddly whimsical and bucolic repose in his second comedy, an affectionate valentine to the small town America that had so captured his imagination earlier on in Shadow of a Doubt. A disastrous failure at the box office, John Michael Hayes’ adaptation of an eponymous play about village folk strangely unperturbed by the appearance of a corpse they each try calmly but unsuccessfully to get rid of, The Trouble With Harry has since been recognized as one of Hitchcock's most surrealist films. Hitchcock's only film set in New England, The Trouble With Harry made dramatic use of its Vermont location and autumnal season, with the fall foliage gorgeously showcased in radiant Technicolor that can be fully appreciated in the splendid and rare vintage print from the Harvard Film Archive collection.