The Man who knew too much
Dr. Ben McKenna, his wife (a famous ex-singer) Jo Conway McKenna and their son, Hank, are spending some really boring time in North Africa, due to Dr. McKenna having taken part in a medicine congress.Accidentally, they meet a strange man, Louis Bernard, who offers them his knowledge to allow the McKenna make their journey more profitable. However, Bernard is murdered some days later but, before he dies, he tells Dr.McKenna that an important person (a foreign diplomat) is about to be murdered in London.
Because of Dr.McKenna being aware of this secret, his son Hank is kidnapped short time later by the criminal gang in order to make McKenna maintain silence on the unveiled secret. Although, Dr.McKenna and his wife Jo will follow Hank's trail, expecting, by the way, to abort the diplomat's murder and save his life.
Their quest will finally end at the Royal Albert Hall of London, where the diplomat's murder is to be executed during the performance, to which the foreign diplomat has been engaged. Jo Conway makes the whole plan fail, and as she is requested to sing one of his famous songs, Hank hears his mother's voice and enables his father to find him. As a result, Hank is set free and the criminal gang caught.
This movie is surely one of the most known Hitchcock's movies and received an Academy Award for its song "Whatever will be". This song is a very important element in this movie: it establishes the necessary link, that will finally allow Hank McKenna to be rescued, apart from the subjacent meaning expressing our impossibility to predict the future.
This point is rather important if we consider that this movie's argument is constantly based on "accidents", which configure the whole film's development (the meeting of Louis Bernard and the McKenna family during the bus trip, the casual coincidence with the Drayton matrimony in the restaurant, etc...). All this "accidents" enforce the deep intention of the song.
At the same time, we shouldn't forget the variety of original scenarios Hitchcock choosed for appearing in this movie, in strong contrast to other movies in which scenic simplicity was almost a tradition (please jump to 'Rope', 'Dial "M" for Murder' or 'Rear Window' to get further information): the powerful scenes of North Africa, the dark and almost tetric Ambrose Chapel where Hank is being held captive or the mighty Royal Albert Hall, at which the whole last stage's action takes place, are the main constitutive examples.
Now it would be really interesting to think which is the real basis of 'The Man who knew too much'. A quick preview would tell us that this film is based upon the son's kidnap, but if we analise this point more accurately, we will find that the main film's center is the constant observation of Jo Conway's as well as Ben McKenna's behavior, rather than Hank's kidnap. For this accounts that sort of "personality transformation" which occurs mainly on Mrs McKenna, but which affects directly her husband's behavior: the at the beginning moderate Jo Conway is turned into an histeric, obsessive and almost egoistic woman as Hank disappears. This has got a direct influence on Dr.McKenna, who seems to become unsure and irreflexive as the movie developes.
This would (once again!) lead us to the fact, quoted in the section 'On Hitchcock's Movies...', that all Hitchcock's films should be regarded as really serious studies on a determined psychological element.
