Marnie Edgar [Tippi Hedren] is a damaged woman.  She is a habitual thief.  She knows no other way to live.  She loves only her horse and her mother.  However, with a set of deep seated psychological issues she remains unable to become a normal person in society.  She eventually becomes employed to Mark Rutland [Sean Connery], who recognises her as the girl who robbed a business associate of his.  Once Mr. Rutland catches her in the act he blackmails her into marrying him so that he can better understand her and fix her.

So my first thought regarding this film is that isn’t Hitchcock supposed to make good films?  Is this his catastrophe?  If so please let me know and let me stop here.  I’ve seen some of his movies (and loved those which I’ve seen so far) but none of them could’ve prepared me for this waste of a movie.  Just because it’s old, stars Sean Connery and is directed by Alfred Hitchcock makes it a good movie.

I felt better if the story was about Marnie robbing Mr. Rutland and who gets the better of the other and she either goes to jail or not like a regular heist film, but they have to bring in this whole second half which drives the story into out of this world odd.  Not to say that a story about a woman who is not functioning correctly due to her childhood is exactly out of this world, but it just felt as if we were given this first half and then we just forgot all about that and decided to take the focus in a completely different direction for almost no reason.

Let me not get all fire and brimstone on this flick just yet.  Yes the acting and the left turn the plot takes halfway through the movie is as sour as lemon but it is a Hitchcock film and it does look like one which is a relief.  Hitchcock does know how to shoot a movie and make it look like something special.  Keeping in mind that this is the 60s and not 2009 you have to make sure not to have ridiculous high expectations for the visuals to match up to films that are made today.  I loved how he was able to show us Marnie’s sort of trigger whenever she saw something red (even though I wasn’t happy all the while with her physical reactions, reminded me too much of things Mel Brooks’ actors would do rather than a real dramatic film).

In the end this is the worst Hitchcock film I’ve seen to date and I wonder exactly what Hitchcock fans think of it?  I wonder if I’m alone in this thinking or just being my usual crazy self.  I would recommend you look elsewhere for entertainment, check out one of Hitchcock’s better movies (like North by Northwest) and try to avoid this one for now.

IMDB says 7.3/10

Rotten Tomatoes says 84%

I say 4.5/10