Reviving Classics - Dial M for Murder

Film: Dial M For Murder
Direction: Alfred Hitchcock
Cast: Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, Robert Cummings
Rating: 4/5

It's not easy for the current generation of movie-goers to appreciate a 1954 thriller that was made without the aid of snazzy technology and enhanced sound systems, which, admittedly, comprise a large part of a film's beauty today.
Here's news: Dial M for Murder, a play adapted by Alfred Hitchcock, lacks not just the advantage of the above two factors. It is also a film that is shot almost entirely in the living room of an apartment, but at no point does it leave you grumbling for anything more - simply because the direction and the lead performances are as beautiful as the intricacy of the play's original plot.
A retired tennis player Tony (Ray Milland) plots to get his millionaire wife Margot (Grace Kelly) killed after he discovers she is in an illicit relationship with an author Mark (Robert Cummings). He blackmails an old colleague from college into committing the crime, but the plot is foiled when Margot instead ends up killing her attacker in self-defense. In well under two hours, the investigation unfolds a wickedly designed ploy, and the guilty is brought to the fore.
The grace of the film lies in the fact that the director does not waste the audience's time with needless foreground to the story or exaggerated heartbreak issues. In the very second scene of the film, he cuts to Tony laying out his master plan, the third scene being the failed execution itself. Albeit a wee bit theatrical in its treatment, Dial M For Murder makes for riveting evening entertainment on your DVD player. And if you have an acquired taste for old classics, this one has got to be a part of your collection!