L'étau

"Topaz" is at its best when Alfred Hitchcock lets the camera tell the story: there are several small but brilliant moments in this film. But while his direction is still masterful, his pacing certainly isn't - the film often feels talky and plodding. The abrupt ending is another problem - one of the alternative endings, the airport one, sounds much better (unfortunately I haven't had the chance to see it yet). Frederick Stafford is no Cary Grant or even Rod Taylor, but he does the job; so do the rest of the actors, with Phillipe Noiret a standout in a brief role and Karin Dor adding a touch of sensuality to the proceedings. On the whole, "Topaz" is not even among Hitchcock's Top 10 pictures, but his fans will still have fun spotting his touches here and there. His cameo - a wheelchair-bound man who suddenly gets up and starts walking (!) - is just one of them. (**1/2)

EDIT: I finally did see the airport ending: it is undeniably better than the present one, but still a bit too abrupt.

Good but no great Hitch film that maintains suspense level , including constant shift of scenarios keeps spectators on their toes . A French intelligence agent named Andre Deveraux (Frederick Stafford) befriends American official called Michael Nordstrom (John Forsythe) and both of whom become involved in the Cold War politics to dig out info , first with uncovering the events leading up to the 1962 Cuban Missle Crisis, and then back to France to discover a secret conspiracy . Andre travels to La Habana to obtain evidences of the Missiles , there meets his lover named Juanita Cordoba (Karin Dor who wears marvelous gowns by Edith Head and dubbed her own voice in the German Version) who is secretly embroiled with a local underground resistance whilst also being entangled in another way with Parra (John Vernon) . Meanwhile, an ex-KGB official defector flees to USA where he is interviewed and tells him about Topaz, the codename for a group of French officials in high circles who work for the Soviet Union , as the protagonists attempt to break up an international Russian spy ring (Philippe Noiret , Michel Piccoli) infiltrated in French government .

This suspenseful Hitchcock film contains cloak-and-dagger intrigue , whirlwind plot , thrills , twists and results to be pretty entertaining . Hitchcock takes you behind the actual headlines to expose the most explosive spy scandal of the century, though this was reportedly one of his most unhappy directing jobs , being Alfred's biggest failure , as it cost approximately $4,000,000 to make and received only $1,000,000 at the box office. According to Donald Spoto's book "The Art of Alfred Hitchcock: Fifty Years Of His Motion Pictures", Universal Pictures executives forced this project on Alfred Hitchcock. Overlong film as a running at 143 minutes, this is Alfred Hitchcock's longest film . The first draft of the script was hired Leon Uris to adapt his own novel , but Uris didn't care for Hitchcock's eccentric sense of humor, nor did he appreciate the director's habit of monopolizing all of his time as they worked through a script. Hitchcock was disappointed that Uris seemed to ignore his requests to humanize the story's villains , in his opinion the novel painted them as cardboard monsters , with only a partial draft completed, Uris left the film. Alfred declared it unshootable at the last minute and called in Samuel A. Taylor , writer of Vertigo , to rewrite it from scratch , as some scenes were written just hours before they were shot. According to Alfred Hitchcock, this was another of his experimental movies ; in addition to the dialogue, the plot is revealed through the use of colors, predominantly red, yellow and white , he admits that this did not work out. Good support cast mostly formed by European actors who give nice interpretations such as : Dany Robin as Nicole Devereaux , Vernon as Rico Parra , gorgeous Karin Dor as Juanita Cordoba , Michel Piccoli a Jacques Granville , Philippe Noiret as Henri Jarre , Claude Jade as Michèle Picard and Roscoe Lee Browne as Philippe Dubois . Of course , habitual Director Cameo , as Alfred Hitchcock appears about 30 minutes in at the airport getting out of a wheelchair . Emotive and sensitive score by Maurice Jarre , Jean Michel Jarre's father ; knowing that he had no ear for music, Alfred Hitchcock didn't even bother listening to Maurice Jarre's completed score for the film, slotting it onto the images without a quibble . Colorful and bright cinematography by excellent cameraman Jack Hildyard who photographed 'Bridge on the river Kai' and David Lean's usual . Appropriate production design by Henry Bumstead , Hitch's ordinary . This is a medium-to-rare Hitchcock picture in which was shot three versions with completely different endings , all are included in the Laserdisc , video , DVD and BluRays reissues.

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"Topaz" is one of Hitchcock's least satisfying films, yet the same time it's one of his most interesting ones, as well. Usually people don't remember it, maybe because there are no famous Hitchcock stars. Either the director didn't get any, or he didn't want them, because the audiences should tightly concentrate on the complex plot.

The film clearly divides into three parts. The one in the middle, which takes place in Cuba, is the best of them. It involves the films most memorable scene, the beautifully photographed murder. Weakest part is the last one, where you might get confused with the messy intrigues.

There are too many characters in the movie, which leaves many of them just bystanders, for example the worried wife (Dany Robin), who doesn't do really anything. The films brightest spot is Karin Dor, who gives an excellent performance as the beautiful Juanita. Too bad that her screen time is quite short. And the ending climax shines with its absence: the film ends like bumping into a wall.

One aspect of "Topaz" that should be kept in mind is that while American and British critics were belittling Hitchcock as a "mere entertainer," the French New Wave critics, led by Francois Truffaut, were lionizing him and Truffaut even published a book-long interview with Hitchcock published in 1967.

Hitchcock hadn't worked in years and was desperately trying to get another movie going when Universal showed him the book "Topaz" -- about spies in the French government, with a French protagonist and climactic scenes in Paris. I think that Hitchcock may have -- unwisely -- decided to do "Topaz" so he could do a "French picture."

There are some great individual scenes in Topaz -- the opening defection in Copenhagen, the suspenseful mission to get secrets from the Cubans in Harlem's Hotel Theresa (Hitchcock in Harlem?!); the hero's dangerous mission into Cuba and the death of his key contact there.

But Hitchcock really didn't like making "Topaz," he was bored and ill and resentful (Universal had killed a project called "Frenzy" -- not to be confused with the 1972 film he made of that name -- and Hitchcock was bitter about it.)

So we end up with a very half-hearted Hitchcock movie with a few good scenes, no real stars, THREE failed endings (all available to see on the DVD), and an attempt to "make nice with my French friends."

While Leon Uris' book is a good read, Hitchcock's adaptation of the book for cinema captures much of the book's selling points. The killing of Juanita by Rico Parra is central to book and the film. The book has a sensual scene where Juanita distracts Parra to allow Andre to escape before she is killed. In the film, Hitchcock dispenses with the sexual distraction to go directly to the killing. The killing of Juanita captured by the overhead camera, shows the purple gown spreading in the floor as blood would have spread. No blood is shown—only the gown. What a brilliant shot from Hitchcock and cameraman Jack Hildyard! The second remarkable facet of the movie is the performance of Phillip Noiret as a French bureaucrat and spy. The lunch sequence (a typical Hitchcock food event) may look simple but the montage of shots capturing Noiret's apparent interest in the food than the conversation is truly engaging. Noiret is a fine actor. So is Michel Piccoli. The two of them outshine Frederick Stafford and John Forsythe.

The third most fascinating shot is post-torture interrogation of Mrs Mendoza—the whispered response from a posture that reminds one of Michelangelo's Pieta—with her dead husband replacing the dead Christ.

Hitchcock's perseverance with "marriage" continues. Andre blandly tells his daughter of his wife "She left me. I did not leave her" after a tryst with his lover in Havana. The Michel Piccoli character says of Andre's wife "Andre, his wife and I were very close. She married him." We know later that Andre's wife was cheating on him as she recognizes the Piccoli character's phone number at his secret love nest.

The defection sequence in Copenhagen might look clumsy—but Hitchcock's style is everywhere—faces in mirrors, close up of a porcelain figure about to be dropped with no music in the background, etc. What was most amusing was the criticism of the American espionage agents: "We would have done it better" and the exchange of words by the defector in Washington, D.C. Andre's outburst to his bosses on the outcome of French intervention in the defection would lead to the defector's assassination is equally poignant had the film ended with the French spy defecting to Russia (one of the alternate endings).

Finally, Hitchcock's use of the newspaper headlines during key scenes in the background was interesting: The Pieta shot had the newspaper shot in the background and the newspaper left behind on a bench in Paris is the final shot. The alternate endings—the duel and the departure of the spies to two cold-warring countries would not have served well as well the suicide of the spy suggested by the gunshot in his house.