- Secret Agent (1936 film)
Infobox_Film
name = Secret Agent
|image_size=175px
caption= original film poster
director =Alfred Hitchcock
producer =Michael Balcon Ivor Montagu
writer =W. Somerset Maugham (novel)Alma Reville (screenplay)
starring =John Gielgud Peter Lorre Madeleine Carroll
Robert Young
cinematography =Bernard Knowles
editing =Charles Fren
released = May1936 (U.K.)June 15 ,1936 (U.S.)
runtime = 86 min
country = UK
language = English
imdb_id = 0028231"Secret Agent" is a 1936 British
film directed byAlfred Hitchcock , based on a byW. Somerset Maugham . The film starredJohn Gielgud ,Peter Lorre ,Madeleine Carroll and Robert Young. Future starMichael Redgrave made a brief, uncredited appearance.Plot
Gielgud plays a British officer, a once famous writer who fakes his death during
World War I , and is sent by the mysterious "R", head ofBritish intelligence , to Switzerland on a secret mission. Meanwhile, Carroll plays a female agent who poses as his wife. Together, they meet their contact in the country, Lorre.Typical
Hitchcockian themes used here includemistaken identity andmurder . The film is notable for calling the hero's superior by a single letter, an idea which writerIan Fleming would use in hisJames Bond stories.External links
*
* [http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=-1536982308887890655&q=Maugham&total=59&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=3 View online]
* Elisabeth Weis, 1982, "The Silent Scream - Alfred Hitchcock's Sound Track" (1982), [http://www.zx.nu/ss/chapter3.htm "Expressionism at its Height: "Secret Agent"] , a discussion of Hitchcoock's use of sound in the film.
* Movie Diva, [http://www.moviediva.com/MD_root/reviewpages/MDSecretAgent.htm 2001 review]
* [http://www.eyegate.com/cine/Secret_Agent/ "Secret Agent" Eyegate Gallery]
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