The Farmer's Wife (1928) - Alfred Hitchcock

The great Alfred Hitchcock, in his time as a filmmaker in the silent period of this art, made about almost ten features, when was still looking for his signature style as the immortal master of suspense, defining his main artistic cornerstones. It was already the mythical year in which the greatest revolution came to the movies, the sound had arrived to stay, to completely reconfigure the film scene, and the great Hitch was thus materializing his last silent exercises. With this picture begins the British his link with his new producer, British International Pictures studios, and after leading Decline (1927), adapted a literary work again, the play of Eden Phillpotts, to introduce a simple story, hilarious, in which a mature man, becomes widowed, after the death of his wife, decides to find a new mate for him, and starts searching for the female, draws up a list of potential prospects, and, aided by his housekeeper, is launched to woo, obtaining one each rejections every time. But when it seems that his target will not be met, thoughtlessly he finds what he wanted in the least expected person. Unusual exercise in the filmography of prodigious Hitchcock, a pleasant comedy, which of course does not approach the biggest films of this remarkable director, is certainly a rarity, but being a silent film of Hitchcock, already has great appeal to be appreciated.

                

In a country house, we see the farmer Samuel Sweetland (Jameson Thomas), passing through a difficult time, his wife has just passed away. He lives with his housekeeper, Araminta Dench (Lillian Hall-Davis) and his butler, Churdles Ash (Gordon Harker); all attend shortly after the wedding of the daughter of Sweetland, after which, the farmer, assisted by his loyal "Minta", elaborates a list of four possible candidates to become his new wife. Then initiates the courtship of each, starting with the widow Louisa Windeatt (Louie Pounds), to whom lets know his intentions, obtaining negative from the widow. Then continues with Thirza Tapper (Maud Gill), who although at first seems to have a different attitude towards the proposal, finally also rejects him, growing frustration in Sweetland. In a fun and crowded meeting, he makes his third attempt, the choice is Mary Hearn (Olga Slade), a woman whose answer is not only negative, but even laughs at the farmer, who responds with some insults, generating her a hysterical attack. The whole town already has learned about the search of the widower, he woos the fourth one, Mercy Bassett (Ruth Maitland), again getting a rejection. Eventually he will find a woman who genuinely loves him, and when two women come back, get surprised to find the farmer happily paired.

The initial image of the picture presents a visual summary of the environment where everything will happen, we see country wildlife, ducks, dogs, cattle, everything surrounding the home, the farm of Samuel; we will see nice images of animals, and then dozens of hunter dogs, field, outdoors, a film that even with these elements goes declaring itself as atypical work of its author. Apparently there are in circulation more than one version, more than one cut of this film, and the film viewing in which this criticism is based on, is a cut of 97 minutes, lower in almost twenty minutes to another version I understand there is. And perhaps is because of that missing material, that we feel a certain frenzy in the early sequences, in which quickly, within a few minutes, the farm is shown, the death of the farmer's wife as well, and also the marriage of the daughter, is possible that in the extended version we might not feel that certain rush of the first few minutes. It is a certainly atypical work of Hitch, it's a comedy, something far more benign to what the master usually did, far from the suspense that would turn him into a legend; however, it is also true that comedy, the comic charge is something that was almost never absent in the films of the British, we always find batched hilarity during the filmmaker's features, and in this case is disseminated in part on the occurrences and certain clumsiness of the housekeeper of one of the courted ladies. Nevertheless, as this is completely a comedy, it is noted that this is a foreign field to the greatest feats of the notorious filmmaker, without being a loose filmic exercise; we are simply witnessing a stage when the creator was still finding himself, and while an important step in this direction was took with The Lodger (1927), discovering the suspense as the main asset of his films, it is evident that the then novel Hitchcock continued in the process of defining his style, as it was largely in his time of silent films.

But unlike almost all his silent features, this time draws the attention the number of dialogues included in this exercise, much more abundant than in his most successful soundless films, as the two already mentioned The Lodger, and Decline, released the same year, films in which that very absence of dialogues made the dramatic charge on actors and on non-verbal audiovisual language were much higher. The picture is simply the process of farmer finding wife, as the title indicates, and for this mission is positive and significant the interpretation of the protagonist, Thomas Jameson, his gestures, eyes wide open, fluorishes and records, representing the more humorous moments, enduring rejections, with which becomes almost a malicious work to appreciate how the man woos women, obtaining respective negatives. Finally, as seen in many stories, the person who is first assistant, the one who starts helping the interested to get coupled, ends up being all that he wanted, he always had in front of his noses, at home, all he thought would find outside. As for his film language, the initial linear narrative of the camera is broken at last when the filmmaker interestingly wields his well known visual narrative resources, and when the good farmer decides to start looking for his new partner, we will appreciate these tools. That's when for the first time in the film appear the overlayed shots, also close-ups, everything tidy in the assembly to set the moment when he draws up the list of candidates, imagining each of them at his home. Also, when we see him preening to start wooing ladies, appears again this montage work, concatenating detailed shots, again close-ups, images of loyal Minta helping him to get ready, again shows his narrative eloquence in pictures. Nice and typical lineament of him, visual storytelling is something in which Hitch always excelled, his silent films were always very visual, and while on the picture this is seen only half-heartedly, it is confirmed that it is an aspect that accompanied the cinema of the British since his beginnings.

One of the funniest parts of the picture comes, no doubt, with the third prospect-to-wife, Mary Hearn, who laughs at Sweetland and his request, he gets angry, he insults her, and she reaches a paroxysm of hysteria seen for the first time that moment. Then at the end of the movie we get back to see it when she changes her mind and wants to marry Samuel, will be surprised that it's late, and again we'll see the arms waving and shouting hysterically, certainly one of the funniest moments, in what feels as a good comedy, but not remarkable. It is not a brilliant film, but gets its mission, amuse and entertain, the little more than an hour and a half of footage from the version I had access to passes quickly, but as stated, although being an entertaining film, feels it is not the field in which the filmmaker would shine so brightly up to reach the highest peaks of cinema. Without his main guidelines, no suspense, no deaths, mysteries and intrigues, without false guilty, the picture certainly is a rarity within the extensive filmography of the British giant. Also, the version I could watch has had a curious musical accompaniment, renowned and illustrious composers, the likes of Mendelssohn and Dvorak, among others, a first-class musical accompaniment, but certainly feels a little -or rather very- strange to acclimate a comedy of this kind, most likely a hearing selection that was not chosen by Hitch. As it could not be otherwise, a happy ending will await the farmer, the faithful Minta finally is the answer to his search, virtuous, discreet and beautiful, after arduous and almost humiliating journey, the beautiful Lillian Hall-Davis, one very relevant silent actress, quietly takes part of the protagonism of the picture. Having already worked with Hitch in The Ring, also from 1927, the beautiful actress, who incidentally Hitchcock himself declared as his favorite actress, could not make the leap to talkies, and find a notorious and tragic end up committing suicide in 1933. It was already the year in which with The Jazz singer, the sound would come to the cinema to change everything forever, all filmmakers and actors undertook new directions in their careers, and here we have Hitch, beginning to find his definitive style, we have in this film a very particular filmic exercise of his, that without being a masterpiece, will seduce British fans for sure.