Silver Screen Standards: To Catch a Thief (1955)
We mostly associate Alfred Hitchcock with tense thrillers and even horror, thanks to his later hits and TV series, but To Catch a Thief (1955) is something else entirely, a glamorous, action-filled romp that presages the age of 007 with its sun-soaked European locations, chase scenes, and a suave protagonist long accustomed to both luxury and women’s desire. Other film writers have connected the later North by Northwest (1959) to the rise of the Bond era, but To Catch a Thief also gives us a good idea of what Grant’s version of the iconic spy would have looked like, with Grace Kelly and Brigitte Auber as the two women competing for his attention. It’s not a particularly serious picture, and fans of Hitchcock’s darker work might prefer his other collaborations with its two leads, but To Catch a Thief is still a lot of fun if you’re looking for spectacle, romance, and pure escapism.
Grant stars as American expat and former cat burglar John Robie, aka The Cat, who has retired from his life of crime and later French Resistance heroism to a very comfortable French villa, while members of his old gang labor in a restaurant run by their associate, Bertani (Charles Vanel). When a string of new robberies copies Robie’s style, the police immediately suspect that The Cat is once again prowling the rooftops of the Riviera, and Bertani’s crew shows open hostility to Robie for endangering everyone’s hard-won parole. Robie sets out to prove his innocence by capturing the real thief with some help from insurance agent Hughson (John Williams) and his clients, wealthy widow Jessie Stevens (Jessie Royce Landis) and her beautiful daughter, Francie (Grace Kelly). As the crime wave continues and Robie closes in on the culprit, both the police and the criminals seem determined to stop him.
Spectacle in the modern action movie generally means exotic locations, lavish events disrupted by some kind of conflict, chase scenes (both on foot and in high-speed vehicles of various kinds), and daring escapes, all of which To Catch a Thief amply provides. The glamor and excitement of the French Riviera are on full display, heightened for the folks in American movie theaters by the frequent use of French in the dialogue. While Kelly wears a dizzying array of gorgeous Edith Head outfits throughout the movie, the biggest fashion spectacle takes place at the 18th-century costume ball, where dozens of party guests in fancy dress show off their wealth and extravagant taste. Robie has to boat, swim, run, drive, and scurry across rooftops as he tries to elude the police and pursue his own prey. Sure, the rear projection car chase with Francie at the wheel seems quaint by today’s CGI-fueled, physics-defying vehicular pursuits, but for 1955 it’s quite thrilling, even projecting to the audience the danger of the moment by repeatedly showing Robie’s nervous hands in the passenger seat. Robie’s initial escape from the police is less frenetic, but it provides a perfect cameo opportunity for Hitchcock and teaches us to expect clever tricks from the protagonist at every turn.
Romance is the other necessary ingredient for this proto-Bond plot, and here, too, we have plenty on offer. Grant’s Robie, as charming and cool as any international man of mystery could hope to be, attracts three important ladies. Chief among them is Grace Kelly’s thrill-seeking heiress, Francie, who is tired of men constantly courting her for her wealth but fascinated by Robie’s notoriety. Her mother, Jessie, also takes a shine to Robie and frequently hints that if she were younger, Francie would have fierce competition for his attention. Finally, although she boasts a prior claim to Robie’s acquaintance thanks to her family’s long association with the gang, we have Danielle Foussard (Brigitte Auber), a young Frenchwoman who constantly offers to run away with him to South America. Robie, for his part, seems ambivalent about all of them and much more interested in clearing his name, and the movie’s most passionate moment lets fireworks stand in for any real ardor from our hero. Although Grant said that Kelly was one of his favorite leading ladies, he was also famously wary of the increasing age difference between himself and his female costars, a fact much discussed in relation to Charade (1963), and that might factor into Robie’s willingness to let the women chase him instead of the other way round. Grant was 51 when To Catch a Thief debuted, and Kelly was half his age at 26; ironically, the younger character, Danielle, was played by the 30-year-old Auber, making the scene where the two women argue about their respective ages even more amusing. Robie and Francie’s mother, Jessie, are really the closest age peers of the lot, but even though Jessie Royce Landis was only eight years older than Grant she ended up being cast as his mother in their next film together, North by Northwest. As gloriously lovely as Grace Kelly is in the movie, I always feel like Jessie deserves better than being sidelined as the lonely widow, denied even a spark with Hughson thanks to his reference to having a wife whose good opinion he seriously values. At any rate, Robie’s sense of distance from the women who want him only makes them chase him more, and it tracks with the way we later see James Bond rarely make real connections with the women he meets, with Tracy (Diana Rigg) in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) as the notable – and tragic – exception.
007 himself would arrive on the cinematic scene in 1962 with Sean Connery in the role for Dr. No, and From Russia with Love hit theaters in 1963, the same year as Grant’s appearance in Charade. Grant’s final screen role came in 1996 with Walk, Don’t Run, a remake of the 1943 picture, The More the Merrier, with Grant in the older matchmaker role originally played by Charles Coburn. For more of Cary Grant and Hitchcock, see Suspicion (1941), Notorious (1946), and, of course, North by Northwest. Grace Kelly made two earlier movies with the director: Dial M for Murder (1954) and Rear Window (1954), but she won an Academy Award for Best Actress for The Country Girl (1954). If handsome jewel thieves make your heart flutter, try Jewel Robbery (1932) and The Thomas Crown Affair (1968). For a few of my personal favorites from the Bond franchise, see A View to a Kill (1985), The Living Daylights (1987), and GoldenEye (1995).
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— Jennifer Garlen for Classic Movie Hub
Jennifer Garlen pens our monthly Silver Screen Standards column. You can read all of Jennifer’s Silver Screen Standards articles here.
Jennifer is a former college professor with a PhD in English Literature and a lifelong obsession with film. She writes about classic movies at her blog, Virtual Virago, and presents classic film programs for lifetime learning groups and retirement communities. She’s the author of Beyond Casablanca: 100 Classic Movies Worth Watching and its sequel, Beyond Casablanca II: 101 Classic Movies Worth Watching, and she is also the co-editor of two books about the works of Jim Henson.
