Family Plot
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| Family Plot | |
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 Original Movie poster |
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| Directed by | Alfred Hitchcock |
| Produced by | Uncredited: Alfred Hitchcock |
| Written by | Novel: 'Victor Canning "The Rainbird Pattern" Screenplay: Ernest Lehman |
| Starring | Karen Black Bruce Dern Barbara Harris William Devane |
| Music by | John Williams |
| Cinematography | Leonard J. South |
| Editing by | J. Terry Williams |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
| Release date(s) |  April 9, 1976 |
| Running time | 121 min. |
| Language | English |
| Budget | US$ 3,000,000 |
| All Movie Guide profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Family Plot is a 1976 Universal motion picture directed by Alfred Hitchcock and starring Karen Black, Bruce Dern, Barbara Harris and William Devane, with Cathleen Nesbitt.
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[edit] Plot
The story involves a fake psychic, con artist Blanche Tyler (played by Harris), and her taxi driver boyfriend, George Lumley (played by Dern), who attempt to locate the nephew of a wealthy and guiltridden old woman, Julia Rainbird (played by Nesbitt). Julia, one of Blanche's clients, was responsible for her now deceased sister giving up the boy for adoption years earlier and now wants to make him her heir. She will pay $10,000 if he is found.
However, the nephew and prospective heir, now a successful jeweler in San Francisco known as Arthur Adamson (played by Devane), who has a secret and lurid past, having apparently murdered his adoptive parents and faked his own death, and his girlfriend, Fran (played by Black), has successfully kidnapped an assortment of millionaires and dignitaries, returning them when the ransom, a valuable gemstone, has been delivered, which they hide in their chandelier.
When Arthur learns that Blanche and George are pursuing him, he suspects the worst, putting their lives in danger.
[edit] Production
This comedy/thriller was Hitchcock's final movie. It was adapted for the screen by Ernest Lehman, based on the novel The Rainbird Pattern (1972) (ISBN 0-441703-93-3) by Victor Canning. Lehmann wanted the film to be sweeping, dramatic and dark but Hithcock kept pushing him toward lightness and comedy. Lehman's screenplay earned him a 1977 Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America.
The novel on which the film is based had earlier been rejected by Ernest Lehman, to whom it had been submitted as a potential project for him to either produce and/or direct. Although Alfred Hitchcock and Ernest Lehman had attempted to work together on several projects following their huge success with North by Northwest, this was their only other project to be filmed. Lehman had incurred Hitchcock's anger by declining the offer to write the screenplay for a thriller, No Bail For the 'Judge, a thriller set in London and meant to star Audrey Hepburn, Laurence Harvey and John Williams. Although Hitchcock eventually got a fine screenplay and preproduction, location scouting, and costumes were well underway, that film was never made.
[edit] Cast
- Hitchcock considered such actors as Burt Reynolds and Roy Scheider (for Adamson), Faye Dunaway (for Fran) and Beverly Sills (for Blanche) for the film . High salary demands were partly responsible for his turning to other actors.
- Although Liza Minnelli was among the stars recommended to Hitchcock, he was especially delighted to work with Barbara Harris as the medium. He had previously tried to hire her for other film projects.
- Hitchcock had earlier worked with Bruce Dern in Marnie, in which he had a brief role in a flashback playing a doomed sailor.
- Hitchcock cast Roy Thinnes in the role of nefarious jeweler Arthur Adamson but, when he and the actor clashed, he fired and replaced him.
[edit] Trivia
- Hitchcock, who often liked to specify the locales of his films by using on-screen titles or by filming famous landmarks, deliberately left the story's location unspecific, using sites in both San Francisco and Los Angeles.
- Alfred Hitchcock's cameo is a signature occurrence in most of his films. In Family Plot he can be seen (38 minutes into the film) in silhouette through the glass door of the Registrar of Births and Deaths.
[edit] External links
| Alfred Hitchcock's films |
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| 1920s: The Pleasure Garden • The Mountain Eagle • The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog • Downhill • Easy Virtue • The Ring • The Farmer's Wife • Champagne • The Manxman • Blackmail • 1930s: Juno and the Paycock • Murder! • Elstree Calling • The Skin Game • Mary • Number Seventeen • Rich and Strange • Waltzes from Vienna • The Man Who Knew Too Much • The 39 Steps • Secret Agent • Sabotage • Young and Innocent • The Lady Vanishes • Jamaica Inn • 1940s: Rebecca • Foreign Correspondent • Mr. & Mrs. Smith • Suspicion • Saboteur • Shadow of a Doubt • Lifeboat • Aventure Malgache • Bon Voyage • Spellbound • Notorious • The Paradine Case • Rope • Under Capricorn • 1950s: Stage Fright • Strangers on a Train • I Confess • Dial M for Murder • Rear Window • To Catch a Thief • The Trouble with Harry • The Man Who Knew Too Much • The Wrong Man • Vertigo • North by Northwest • 1960s: Psycho • The Birds • Marnie • Torn Curtain • Topaz • 1970s: Frenzy • Family Plot |
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