The Paradine Case is a 1947 American courtroom drama film, set in England, directed by Alfred Hitchcock and produced by David O. Selznick. Maddalena Anna Paradine (Alida Valli) is a very beautiful and enigmatic young foreign woman, currently living in London, who is accused of poisoning her older, blind husband, a retired military man, at their grand home in the Lake District. It is not clear whether she is a grateful and devoted wife who has been falsely accused, or whether she is instead a calculating and ruthless femme fatale. Mrs. Paradines solicitor Sir Simon (Charles Coburn) hires Anthony Keane (Gregory Peck), a brilliant and successful barrister, to defend her in court. Although Keane has been happily married for 11 years, he instantly becomes deeply infatuated with this exotic, mysterious, and fascinating client. Keanes kind-hearted wife Gay (Ann Todd) sees his infatuation, and although her husband offers to get off the case, she presses him to continue. She knows that a guilty verdict, followed by Paradines hanging, will mean that she will lose her husband emotionally forever. The only way that she can regain her husbands love and devotion is if he is able to obtain a not guilty verdict for Mrs. Paradine. Meanwhile Keane himself starts to focus his legal efforts on Colonel Paradines mysterious servant, André Latour (Louis Jourdan). Consciously or unconsciously, Keane sees Latour as a suitable scapegoat on whom he can pin the crime of murder, but this strategy backfires. After Keane has pressured Latour in court, triggering an angry outburst, word comes that Latour has killed himself. Anna Paradine is coldly furious that Keane has destroyed Latour, who was in fact her lover. On the witness stand she tells Keane she hates him, and that he has murdered the only person she loved. She goes so far as to say that she poisoned her husband in order to be with Latour. Keane is overwhelmed, physically, intellectually and emotionally. Attempting to sum up, he improvises a brief and faltering speech, admitting how poorly he has handled the case, but cannot continue speaking, and has to leave the court. He stays overnight at Sir Simons office, feeling that his career is in ruins. His wife finds him there; she offers conciliation, and hope for the future.
Posted on: Sun, 30 Mar 2014 16:03:01 +0000