Foreign Correspondent

An American reporter sent to Europe on the edge of war witnesses the assassination of a diplomat. The trail takes him to the Netherlands and to London. The film builds its suspense on a few large sequences: an escape through umbrellas in the rain, the sails of a windmill turning the wrong way, and an aircraft going into the ocean. The narrative connects them loosely; the sequences are the point. Alfred Hitchcock directed, in one of his first American films. The closing speech, made while America was still out of the war, is openly an appeal, and the film entered the propaganda argument of its time because of it. Who it's for: those who like classic Hitchcock suspense. Who it's not for: viewers wanting a tight plot; the narrative jumps from set piece to set piece.