‘Family Plot‘, Alfred Hitchcock‘s last film, made in 1976, is the story of the confrontation between two couples of swindlers. In the opening scene of the film, we meet in action the first couple – a pseudo-fortune teller named Blanche and her lover, the driver-actor George. They receive the mission to search for a missing person, with the promise of a fee far greater than the earnings of their usual little scams. The two get into the taxi driven by George, argue a lot, and the car almost hits on the pedestrian crossing a blonde woman dressed in black. The camera abandons Blanche and George to follow the woman, who is Fran, the female partner in the other couple, much larger-scale crooks who deal in sophisticated kidnappings with ransoms in diamonds. It is the first but not the last coincidence in a script (written by Ernest Lehman based on a novel by British thriller author Victor Canning) that would have been judged more harshly in terms of verisimilitude, if Hitchcock were not so explicit in his intentions to start from a rather gloomy theme and treat it in a register of farce combined with action comedy. It is one of the few comedies directed by Hitchcock and, in my opinion, the funniest of them all.
The story evolves in the two parallel plans represented by the two couples of swindlers. One seeks the other and from a moment on the chase is mutual. Only in the final scenes of the last quarter of an hour of the film do the four meet in a confrontation with a final ‘twist’ typical for Hitchcock. The cast is diverse and interesting. The couple formed by the little crooks is better fleshed out, with Bruce Dern (the father of …) demonstrating his comedic talents and Barbara Harris in the delicious role of Blanche. Karen Black at least creates an unforgettable silhouette, but William Devane is an unconvincing ‘bad guy’, and when the villain is not evil enough the whole film suffers. The action scenes are excellent, on par with those of the great films of the 1950s in the master’s filmography, and the cinematography uses Hitchcock‘s ‘color code’ with red (red taxi!) hinting at danger and green introducing the counterpoint of deception. Karen Black, in the action scenes wears ,of course, a blonde wig.
Although it did not enjoy the success that Hitchcock hoped for, ‘Family Plot‘ is a film with many qualities. In retrospect, the master seems to draw the line with a comic film, a self-parody in the genre he perfected. We now know that this was to be his last film, but Hitchcock did not intend for ‘Family Plot‘ to be a career-ending one. In the following years, he worked on another project, a more ‘serious’ espionage film, also collaborating with screenwriter Ernest Lehman, who had also Americanized and adapted ‘Family Plot‘. It was no longer to be, time caught up with him. We are left with the last version of his famous cameo, a sequence in which Hitchcock himself appeared in a single frame, somewhere in each of his films. Here we see him as a silhouetted shadow on a frosted glass door. It is the door to the Births and Deaths Registry Office. Farewell, Master!