Hitchcock

As a lover of all things movie making, Alfred Hitchcock and Hollywood, I was easily engaged in Hitchcock from start to finish. But in the first 30 minutes I knew that you could kill of any chance of this being one of the better movies of 2012.

This over-simplistic tale would have made a better TV biopic and it mightily surpasses HBO’s recent Hitchcock biopic, The Girl. 

What does work here is the relationship between Alfred (Anthony Hopkins) and his wife Alma (Helen Mirren). This is a nice film, not a great one. And to use a quote from the film (not the stillbirth one), “Charming. Doris Day should do it as a musical.”

Simply put: Fun for fans of movie making, but this film is hardly worthy of the Master of Suspense.

Award potential: Anthony Hopkins was inconsistent, but Helen Mirren was consistently wonderful enough to have a chance at an Oscar nomination — but probably won’t make the cut. If there were 7 nominees, not 5, she’d be up for another award. In another year, I'd also mention Best Makeup.

The ten buck review: Worth two bucks. A great rental.