Torn Curtain | 1966    

Updated February 25, 2022

Critical Consensus

Vince Leo | Qwipster        
Kevin Maher | The Times        
Alex McLevy | The A.V. Club        
Dennis Schwartz | Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews        
Dave Kehr | Chicago Reader        
Jeffrey M. Anderson | Combustible Celluloid        
JPRoscoe | Basement Rejects        
Frank Ehrlacher | Movie Master        
Tony Sloman | RadioTimes        
Mark Baker | Carstairs Considers        
Ryan McDonald | Shameless Self Expression        
Bosley Crowther | The New York Times        
Dan Callahan | Slant Magazine        
Terrence J. Brady | Dial H for Hitchcock        
Tim Brayton | Alternate Ending        

 Fix a critic’s review

Summary & Info

Torn Curtain
An American physicist (Paul Newman) defects to East Germany during the height of the Cold War, taking with him his stunned fiancée (Julie Andrews). However, once behind the Iron Curtain it becomes apparent that the defection is a ploy to uncover Soviet nuclear secrets and the two have to try and escape back to the West. Cast: Lila Kedrova, Hansjörg Felmy, Tamara Toumanova, Ludwig Donath, Wolfgang Kieling and Günter Strack. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. [2:08 – PG]

Dueling Critics

thumbs-up

“[C]lassic Hitch all of the way…not only a genuinely good Hitchcock spy yarn, but there aren’t many of its ilk done better. Exciting, suspenseful, funny, and with lots of feeling, this is top-quality entertainment of the highest order…this is still a film made by a director at the top of his game.”
– Vince Leo
thumbs-up

“[N]either the worst nor the dullest Hitchcock film, but it’s pretty damn hard to like, and an unpleasantly strong suggestion that the director, having made such a commanding number of masterpieces in the preceding three decades, was simply running out of things to say and ways of saying them.”
– Tim Brayton

Video

Torn Curtain | 2022

    

Updated February 25, 2022

Critical Consensus

Vince Leo | Qwipster        
Kevin Maher | The Times        
Alex McLevy | The A.V. Club        
Dennis Schwartz | Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews        
Dave Kehr | Chicago Reader        
Jeffrey M. Anderson | Combustible Celluloid        
JPRoscoe | Basement Rejects        
Frank Ehrlacher | Movie Master        
Tony Sloman | RadioTimes        
Mark Baker | Carstairs Considers        
Ryan McDonald | Shameless Self Expression        
Bosley Crowther | The New York Times        
Dan Callahan | Slant Magazine        
Terrence J. Brady | Dial H for Hitchcock        
Tim Brayton | Alternate Ending        

 Fix a critic’s review

Dueling Critics

thumbs-up“[C]lassic Hitch all of the way…not only a genuinely good Hitchcock spy yarn, but there aren’t many of its ilk done better. Exciting, suspenseful, funny, and with lots of feeling, this is top-quality entertainment of the highest order…this is still a film made by a director at the top of his game.”
– Vince Leo
thumbs-down“[N]either the worst nor the dullest Hitchcock film, but it’s pretty damn hard to like, and an unpleasantly strong suggestion that the director, having made such a commanding number of masterpieces in the preceding three decades, was simply running out of things to say and ways of saying them.”
– Tim Brayton

Summary & Info

Torn Curtain
An American physicist (Paul Newman) defects to East Germany during the height of the Cold War, taking with him his stunned fiancée (Julie Andrews). However, once behind the Iron Curtain it becomes apparent that the defection is a ploy to uncover Soviet nuclear secrets and the two have to try and escape back to the West. Cast: Lila Kedrova, Hansjörg Felmy, Tamara Toumanova, Ludwig Donath, Wolfgang Kieling and Günter Strack. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. [2:08 – PG]

Video