Champagne

One of Alfred Hitchcock's silent-film comedies, "Champagne" is good light, bubbly entertainment, much as the title might suggest. It is very interesting to see the future Master of Suspense at work with such different material, and it's a good little film in its own right.

The story-line is very simple: a spoiled rich girl defies her powerful father to meet her boyfriend, and her father, convinced that the boyfriend is only a fortune hunter, resorts to a variety of tactics to try to break off the relationship. Meanwhile, everywhere the girl goes, the same mysterious stranger seems to pop up.

It's not much of a plot, but Hitchcock does some nice things with it. The visuals make the movie fun to watch - attractive sets, good sight gags, interesting detail. As the rich daughter, Betty Balfour is charming and is especially good in a couple of scenes where her character has to perform some unfamiliar tasks. Gordon Harker is, as always, quite funny as the father. His timing works nicely with Hitchcock's pacing.

Hitchcock's dry British wit made most of his silent comedies very pleasurable to watch. If you admire Hitchcock, or if you enjoy silent films, treat yourself to some "Champagne".

Hitchcock liked to isolate people on trains and ships and force them to interact with whomever was in that setting. In this one, the spoiled brat daughter of tycoon lives the life of a princess on her father's money. She is wasteful and shallow and draws attention in that Paris Hilton kind of way. We know that she must have a good heart but now, anything that happens to her is deserved. Enter her father, who wants to teach her a lesson. After all, she has embarrassed him time and time again. She is going to elope with her nice young man, who finds her a bit insufferable at times. He hangs in there while she tests the limits of her entitlement. She is eventually reduced to fending for herself. Hitchcock does a decent job with this but I think there could have been a bit more to it. He got just a bit lazy here. Still, it is billed as a comedy, not "The Scarlet Letter," so there is a lighter touch. It's certainly worth a peek.

For those of you used to Hitchcock mysteries, whodunits and what nots, this VERY early work will come as a big surprise. But it's not surprise that this is quite the feast for the eyes, and quite amazing to watch for it's technical details.

The plot is simple, but yet detailed. A rich socialite daughter elopes with the man she wants to marry (with quite an amazing entrance with the female character), they flee to Paris, where she finds out her rich daddy is rich no more, and suddenly, she must face the glamourous 1920's world from a very different perspective..

Hitchcock fills the screen with a lot of details in this one, and one quite marvels at all the amazing camerawork going on. The special effects and finally the COSTUMES (!) are quite incredible as well. A cool movie!

There's not much to this film of Hitch's, a bit like champagne itself but not so mirth-inducing. Maybe you already know it but he went on make better films than this – many of 'em in fact, but notwithstanding that I still find this one an enjoyable watch.

Spoilt little rich girl Betty Balfour is taught a salutary if convoluted lesson by her Wall Street father ably played by Gordon Harker on how to behave as befits the daughter of a millionaire. In this exercise he sorts out the problem of the genuineness of Betty's suitor too. Some of the sets were as flimsy as the plot (almost diaphanous!) but would have made do for the audience that would only see it the once, and some of the photography and ideas were excellent with some, like the view through the bottom of the glass re-used by Hitch years later. Gurning through a wide range of emotions Betty Balfour kept on Bouncing Back in the same manner as Squibs, her famous role, whilst Gordon Harker excelled at playing this type of role before he started parodying himself in the '30's and playing up his down to Earth voice and mannerisms. And even Claude Hulbert made a 3 second appearance on the club stairs in one of his first film roles. If nothing else, it's worth a watch for the sinister Hitchcockian twist at the very end.

All told, not a great but an interesting film with a pleasant atmosphere, but because there's so few extant it's definitely a satisfying British silent film.

This film is a real mixed bag of sorts. The film follows a woman named Betty who is in love with her rich boyfriend. However, Betty also has a substantial amount of money and Betty's father believes that her boyfriend is a gold-digger. Betty takes her father's plane and goes after her boyfriend anyway who is on a ship heading to France. Betty attempts to get married to her boyfriend but they get in an argument and separate after they reach France. After getting back together Betty's father tells her that they have lost all of their money in the stock market which causes Betty's boyfriend to leave again. Will her boyfriend return or is he really a gold-digger? The story isn't very interesting when it comes down to it although I did enjoy the twist at the end of the film.

As for the acting, it's actually pretty good. Betty Balfour plays Betty and does a stupendous job at it. She seems to fit into the role very naturally and does a good job at not exaggerating emotions like in most silent films. Gordon Harker plays Betty's father Mark and seems to do a good job at seeming unpleased with his daughter's decision. And finally Jean Bradin plays Betty's boyfriend and he also does a good job in the role. While the acting is good, it doesn't save the film.

The special effects in the film are flawed and some of them seem obvious which isn't very good at all. However, the music is stupendous here and does a great job at creating emotions which you don't normally get from films of this time period. The camera angles and shots being used are truly ahead of their time which helps the film.

Even though I praised many aspects of the film the plot just feels so basic and uninteresting plus the poor quality of the special effects really hurt the atmosphere and immersion of the film. So while it has many positives it also has many negatives which causes it to equal out to a very mediocre film. Score: 4/10