Family Plot (1976)

A phony psychic/con artist and her taxi driver/private investigator boyfriend encounter a pair of serial kidnappers while trailing a missing heir in California.

Director:

Alfred Hitchcock

Writers:

Ernest Lehman (screenplay), Victor Canning (novel)

Stars:

Karen Black, Bruce Dern, Barbara Harris

Nominated for 1 Golden Globe. Another 2 wins & 5 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Karen Black	...	Fran
Bruce Dern	...	George Lumley
Barbara Harris	...	Blanche Tyler
William Devane	...	Arthur Adamson
Ed Lauter	...	Joseph Maloney
Cathleen Nesbitt	...	Julia Rainbird
Katherine Helmond	...	Mrs. Maloney
Warren J. Kemmerling	...	Grandison
Edith Atwater	...	Mrs. Clay
William Prince	...	Bishop Wood
Nicholas Colasanto	...	Constantine
Marge Redmond	...	Vera Hannagan
John Lehne	...	Andy Bush
Charles Tyner	...	Wheeler
Alexander Lockwood	...	Parson

Storyline

The trickster Madam Blanche Tyler lures the elder millionaire Julia Rainbird that believes she is a spiritualist. After a séance, she discovers that Julia is tormented by her past, when she forced her sister and single mother Harriet to deliver her baby for adoption to avoid a family scandal. Julia promises the small fortune of ten thousand-dollar to Blanche if she finds her nephew and heir of her fortune using her phony powers. Blanche asks her boyfriend George Lumley, who is an unemployed actor working as cab driver, to investigate the whereabouts of Julia's nephew. Meanwhile, the greedy jeweler and collector Arthur Adamson kidnaps wealthy people with his girlfriend Fran to increase his collection of diamonds with the ransom. When George concludes that Arthur Adamson might be the heir of Julia Rainbird, the reckless Blanche gets in trouble with the kidnappers.

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Plot Keywords:

medium | ransom | inheritance | san francisco california | based on novel | 

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Taglines:

From the devious mind of Alfred Hitchcock, a diabolically entertaining motion picture.

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Genres:

Comedy | Crime | Drama | Thriller

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Certificate:

PG

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

9 April 1976 (USA)

Also Known As:

Deceit

Filming Locations:

4254 Lexington Avenue, Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$4,490,375 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal Pictures, Alfred J. Hitchcock Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

120 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Cinematographer Leonard J. South once said of working with Sir Alfred Hitchcock on this movie: "He asks what lens you have on the camera, then he looks at the scene and he knows what will appear on the screen. He's rarely wrong, and he never moves the camera without a reason. When it moves, it's because the audience should be looking around with the actors. He's very specific about that."

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Goofs

When the Adamsons return home from kidnapping the bishop, Blanche's Mustang is parked on the opposite side and Bruce Dern is standing beside. Even if he followed them, he couldn't arrive before them.

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Quotes

Arthur Adamson: [to Fran] We're gonna have to kill these two ourselves.

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Crazy Credits

The Universal logo does not appear anywhere on this film.

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Connections

Spoofed in High Anxiety (1977)

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Soundtracks

Rejoice, the Lord Is King
(1744) (uncredited)
Music by John Darwall
Lyrics by Charles Wesley

User Reviews

A Tale Of Two Con Games

Alfred Hitchcock's final film Family Plot is a story of two male and female criminal partnerships. The first pair is Bruce Dern and Barbara Harris who are a pair of small time grifters and we meet them in the process of fleecing a rich old spinster Cathleen Nesbitt with a phony psychic act.

The second pair are William Devane and Karen Black who have a lovely line in ransom kidnappings. They've really got it worked out to a science, including a soundproof hidden room in Devane's basement where the victims can be stashed until the ransom is paid.

Nesbitt confesses that she had her late sister give up an out of wedlock child during a séance and now she'd like to make amends by finding him and making him her heir. So with a finder's fee in mind Dern and Harris start digging.

Their paths cross Devane and Black as the police are hunting them so it becomes quite an interesting set of circumstances as Devane and Black suspect the others of being police operatives.

Hitchcock cleverly interweaves the stories of the two couples into a very cohesive plot. The players all hit the mark with their roles,] especially Devane, a smooth talking killer in the Hitchcock tradition of Otto Kruger in Saboteur, Tom Helmore in Vertigo, and James Mason in North By Northwest.

The ending is a bit of a surprise though, it comes rather abruptly. I have to confess I didn't like it at first, but it does kind of grow on you with repeated viewings.

Family Plot is a good for the master of suspense to go out on.