Jamaica Inn (1939)

Director:

Alfred Hitchcock

Writers:

Sidney Gilliat (screenplay) &
Joan Harrison (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

13 October 1939 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Crime

Plot:

In Cornwall, around 1800, a young woman discovers that she's living near a gang of criminals who arrange shipwrecks for profit.

Plot Keywords:

Inn | Pirate | Orphan | Shipwreck | Ship

US TV Schedule:

Tue. Nov. 24

4:30 AM

TCM

Cast

Charles Laughton	...	Sir Humphrey Pengallan
Horace Hodges	...	His Butler
Hay Petrie	...	His Groom
Frederick Piper	...	His Agent
Herbert Lomas	...	His Tenant
Clare Greet	...	His Tenant
William Devlin	...	Hiss Tenant
Jeanne De Casalis	...	His Friend (as Jeanne de Casalis)
Mabel Terry-Lewis	...	His Friend (as Mabel Terry Lewis)
A. Bromley Davenport	...	His Friend (as Bromley Davenport)
George Curzon	...	His Friend
Basil Radford	...	His Friend
Leslie Banks	...	Joss Merlyn
Marie Ney	...	Patience - His Wife
Maureen O'Hara	...	Mary - His Niece

Runtime:

108 min | USA:98 min | Canada:90 min (Ontario)

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Photophone System)

Certification:

Finland:K-12 (1995) | Finland:K-15 (2006) | Australia:G (TV rating) | Canada:PG (Ontario) | UK:A (original rating) | France:U | USA:Approved (PCA #02483) | USA:Passed (National Board of Review) | Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Germany:12 | Sweden:15 | UK:U

Filming Locations:

Associated British Elstree Studios, Shenley Road, Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, England, UK

Company:

Mayflower Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

Alfred Hitchcock made no cameo appearance in this movie.

Goofs:

Continuity: When Mary takes off Jem's rope, she is on his left side. In the next shot, she is on his right.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Captain: Can you make out the beacon light?

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Blue Murder: Tooth and Claw (#5.3)" (2009)

...OK until you read the book

I was pleasantly surprised when I first saw Hitchcock's 'Jamaica Inn'. I had heard so many bad things about the movie and the fact that it seemed to have been made on the cheap and in a hurry so Hitch could do a runner to Hollywood. I really liked this movie - I thought the lovely Maureen O'Hara made a very spirited Mary Yellan and Leslie Banks was great as her hulking bully of an Uncle, Joss. While not as technically inventive as some of Hitchcock's other work before or since, I felt it was made with care and presented a realistic, gloomy atmosphere of doom with its endless night time scenes and constant soundtrack of howling winds and crashing waves.

And then I read the book...

Du Maurier's novel was so different as to bear no relation whatever to Hitchcock's film. The book was intense, gritty, dark and very moody. Mary Yellan was written almost as she is presented on screen with her sharp, Irish wits but Joss is a much more tortured, boorish animal than he is in the film. Also, the character played by Charles Laughton is absent in the book - or at least Laughton's incarnation is. The squire in the book is one of the good guys and features very little. The film of 'Jamaica Inn' may as well be called the Charles Laughton Show so as to give the actor every chance to overact.

See the film if you are a Hitchcock fan and enjoy it for what it is but if you've read and enjoyed the book, my advice would be to steer clear!