IMDb RATING
7.3/10
12K
YOUR RATING
A landlady suspects her new lodger is the madman killing women in London.A landlady suspects her new lodger is the madman killing women in London.A landlady suspects her new lodger is the madman killing women in London.
IMDb RATING
7.3/10
12K
YOUR RATING
- Director
- Writers
- Marie Belloc Lowndes(from the novel by)
- Eliot Stannard(scenario)
- Alfred Hitchcock(uncredited)
- Stars
Top credits
- Director
- Writers
- Marie Belloc Lowndes(from the novel by)
- Eliot Stannard(scenario)
- Alfred Hitchcock(uncredited)
- Stars
- Awards
- 1 win & 2 nominations
Daisy Campbell
- Motheras Mother
- (uncredited)
Maudie Dunham
- First Victimas First Victim
- (uncredited)
Reginald Gardiner
- Dancer at Ballas Dancer at Ball
- (uncredited)
Eve Gray
- Showgirl Victimas Showgirl Victim
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writers
- Marie Belloc Lowndes(from the novel by) (play "Who Is He?")
- Eliot Stannard(scenario)
- Alfred Hitchcock(uncredited)
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
- All cast & crew
Storyline
A serial killer known as "The Avenger" is on the loose in London, murdering blonde women. A mysterious man arrives at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Bunting looking for a room to rent. The Bunting's daughter is a blonde model and is seeing one of the detectives assigned to the case. The detective becomes jealous of the lodger and begins to suspect he may be the avenger. —Col Needham <col@imdb.com>
- Genres
- Certificate
- Not Rated
- Parents guide
Did you know
- TriviaFor the opening of this movie, Alfred Hitchcock wanted to show the Avenger's murder victim being dragged out of the Thames River at night with the Charing Cross Bridge in the background, but Scotland Yard refused his request to film at the bridge. Hitchcock repeated his request several times, until Scotland Yard notified him that they would "look the other way" if he could do the filming in one night. Hitchcock quickly sent his cameras and actors out to Charing Cross Bridge to film the scene, but when the rushes came back from the developers, the scene at the bridge was nowhere to be found. Hitchcock and his assistants searched through the prints, but could not find it. Finally, Hitchcock discovered that his cameraman had forgotten to put the lens on the camera before filming the night scene.
- GoofsFrom 24.56 until 27.31 minutes - The Lodger (Ivor Novello) and Daisy (June Tripp) are seen playing a game of chess, unfortunately the chess board was incorrectly set up, so that the bottom-right square is black. At 25.57 minutes, the improper backwards set up is obvious.
- Crazy creditsClosing credits: Thank you to everyone who supported the BFI's Silent Hitchcock restoration project.
- Alternate versionsThe original version of The Lodger directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1926 was restored in 1999 in honor of the directors 100th anniversary. The film was restored by the British National Film & TV Archives and a new score by Ashley Irwin was commissioned by ZDF/ARTE (Germany) and premiered on August 13, 1999 (what would have been Hitchcock's 100th birthday).
- ConnectionsEdited into Histoire(s) du cinéma: Une vague nouvelle (1999)
Top review
A Nation of Shopkeepers and Murderers
I wonder if this would be identifiable as a Hitchcock movie if it weren't identified as such. Maybe. It as a few innovative touches anyway although it's often a little primitive.
For one thing it's a theme -- a serial murderer in a comfortably bourgeois setting -- that Hitchcock would return to from time to time. "Frenzy," for instance, and "Shadow of a Doubt." But this isn't really typical in that the later Hitchcock would have complicated the story, or juiced it up, by having the innocent eponymous "lodger" guilty of something or other -- maybe just having a closet full of ladies' garments. As it is, he's made Ivor Novello a bit odd looking, given him effete gestures, more makeup than the other men, suggesting that he's gay. Other characters refer to him as "queer" (in the old-fashioned sense of quirky) and say of him that "he's not keen on the ladies." (Ivor Novello was himself gay.)
There's also a scene in which a sexy young girl is happily taking a bath while the lodger tries to sneak into the bathroom. Shades of "Psycho."
And when the lodger is pacing back and forth in his upstairs room, the family look up at the ceiling at the jiggling chandelier and the ceiling becomes transparent so we can see the shoes of the suspect. Oh, it's not "elegant," but it IS "original." Hitchcock was trying something new even then.
Then too, there is a scene in a kind of -- boutique? Is that the right word? A fancy dress shop where the heroine models. The prissy looking lodger is seated between two dolls in cloche hats -- I'm afraid I'm guessing again -- and one of them puts an unlit cigarette in her mouth, waiting for the smooth gentleman to light it for her, and maybe buy her that smashing dress too. But the lodger has noticed that -- well, to be frank -- the woman's bare KNEE is on display, the flapper! So, get this, staring straight ahead, he takes out his lighter, flicks it lit, and moves it to the side so she can reach it. Then he disengages himself, stands up, and walks off, to her irritation. It was not necessary to do the scene in that particular fashion but it's the kind of thing Hitchcock would dream up, a small but telling detail.
Hitchcock makes his cameo in the crowd of people trying to clobber the lodger, who is hung up on a fence by his handcuffs. (Christian symbolism? I doubt it.) Hitchcock's presence is clear enough in still shots but the print I saw was so old and scratchy half the scene was obscured.
Why didn't Hitchcock make an outright movie about Jack the Ripper instead of this one, with an innocent "Avenger." We never find out who or what the real murderer is avenging. Come to think of it, we never even see him. Maybe Hitch wasn't too fond of period pictures. The few that he made were anything but hits. Hitch making a movie set in 1885? What's next? Hitch remaking the shootout at the OK Corral? Hitch doing a biography of Moses? Nah. He had a pretty good sense of his talents and their limitations. When he misjudged them it was usually in the matter of technique, not subject.
Worth seeing. In fact, an interesting story.
For one thing it's a theme -- a serial murderer in a comfortably bourgeois setting -- that Hitchcock would return to from time to time. "Frenzy," for instance, and "Shadow of a Doubt." But this isn't really typical in that the later Hitchcock would have complicated the story, or juiced it up, by having the innocent eponymous "lodger" guilty of something or other -- maybe just having a closet full of ladies' garments. As it is, he's made Ivor Novello a bit odd looking, given him effete gestures, more makeup than the other men, suggesting that he's gay. Other characters refer to him as "queer" (in the old-fashioned sense of quirky) and say of him that "he's not keen on the ladies." (Ivor Novello was himself gay.)
There's also a scene in which a sexy young girl is happily taking a bath while the lodger tries to sneak into the bathroom. Shades of "Psycho."
And when the lodger is pacing back and forth in his upstairs room, the family look up at the ceiling at the jiggling chandelier and the ceiling becomes transparent so we can see the shoes of the suspect. Oh, it's not "elegant," but it IS "original." Hitchcock was trying something new even then.
Then too, there is a scene in a kind of -- boutique? Is that the right word? A fancy dress shop where the heroine models. The prissy looking lodger is seated between two dolls in cloche hats -- I'm afraid I'm guessing again -- and one of them puts an unlit cigarette in her mouth, waiting for the smooth gentleman to light it for her, and maybe buy her that smashing dress too. But the lodger has noticed that -- well, to be frank -- the woman's bare KNEE is on display, the flapper! So, get this, staring straight ahead, he takes out his lighter, flicks it lit, and moves it to the side so she can reach it. Then he disengages himself, stands up, and walks off, to her irritation. It was not necessary to do the scene in that particular fashion but it's the kind of thing Hitchcock would dream up, a small but telling detail.
Hitchcock makes his cameo in the crowd of people trying to clobber the lodger, who is hung up on a fence by his handcuffs. (Christian symbolism? I doubt it.) Hitchcock's presence is clear enough in still shots but the print I saw was so old and scratchy half the scene was obscured.
Why didn't Hitchcock make an outright movie about Jack the Ripper instead of this one, with an innocent "Avenger." We never find out who or what the real murderer is avenging. Come to think of it, we never even see him. Maybe Hitch wasn't too fond of period pictures. The few that he made were anything but hits. Hitch making a movie set in 1885? What's next? Hitch remaking the shootout at the OK Corral? Hitch doing a biography of Moses? Nah. He had a pretty good sense of his talents and their limitations. When he misjudged them it was usually in the matter of technique, not subject.
Worth seeing. In fact, an interesting story.
helpful•208
- rmax304823
- Jul 18, 2004
Details
Box office
- Budget
- £12,000 (estimated)
- Gross worldwide
- $83,260
- Runtime1 hour 32 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
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Top Gap
By what name was The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1927) officially released in India in English?
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