Dial M for Murder (VHS, 1999)

In this Hitchcock low-key suspense, there's no question about "who done it?." Tony Wendice (Ray Milland), a former pro-tennis player, who's unhappily married to wife Margot (Grace Kelly, in her prime), knows she's been having an affair with a crime story writer, Mark Halliday (Robert Cummings). This film is a study of Wendice's plodding determination to get revenge & money to pay off his staggering debts. Rather than behaving like a desperate villain, bent upon spousal homicide, Wendice is cool, calm, calculating & a character with whom it is surprisingly possible to sympathsize.

Unbeknownst to lovers Margot & Mark, Tony's wide aware of their affair. More than wanting to teach Mark a lesson by murdering Margot, Wendice is bent upon maintaining his status by remaining in the upper crust among peers whose success makes them wealthy enough. He returns to view the photograph of his college classmates (among which Hitchcock stands, making his trademark cameo), a stark reminder of his failure in business. Power is what Wendice has to possess. His plan becomes more complex when he blackmails a former classmate to murder Margot. This act of manipulation reveals Wendice's wanton need to have power-over his peers.

Hitchcock lets every viewer in on Wendice's murderous, blackmailing plot. The element of suspense is the build-up as the husband with a vengence begins to set each step of his scheme into motion. The question for the audience is, "will Wendice succeed?"

"Dial M for Murder" succeeds. Filming ala Hitchcock's keen imaginary in 3D, casting Grace Kelly in the prime of her acting career, the suave Ray Milland & charming Robert Cummings, featuring well-scripted dialogue between these 3 main characters all gel to make for the perfect murder plot.

Ray Milland is as dispassionate as he is undetectably sly. While plotting the murder of his adulterous wife with an absolutely confident demeanor while being so needful to prove his worth is a brilliant bit of acting. 1954 is the year that the future Princess of Monaco gives an Oscar-winning performance in "The Country Girl" (co-starring Bing Crosby), and an Oscar-worthy performance in another Hitchcock all time classic, "Rear Window" (co-satrring Jimmy Stewart). Kelly's the ravingly beautiful blonde who's not used as a bombshell for sexual appeal; but rather, is consistently a woman of both strength of character & will who is also vulnerable, as well as any man's intellectual match.

This is Alfred Hitchcock's first color film. The master of suspense proves he's just as capable of manipulating an audience with color cinematography as he'd been with B&W. T-totally classic~