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For all the flourishes that demonstrate Alfred Hitchcock was at least somewhat engaged with material, Jamaica Inn still evinces the sight of the controlling director being overrun by his star with his mind largely elsewhere. Coming right before his transatlantic crossing to work with a minor American studio, David O. Selznick had yet to produce Gone with the Wind, Jamaica Inn has less to do with Hitchcock’s typical suspense and a lot more to do with melodrama. He had already managed to make The Lady Vanishes, The 39 Steps, and the Peter Lorre version of The Man Who Knew Too Much, each technically daring and filled with glorious bits of suspense, comedy, and adventure, so Jamaica Inn’s routine flatlining is something of a surprise.
Then again, this is really the Charles Laughton show. We learn early on that Laughton’s Sir Humphrey Pengallan is orchestrating the roving gangs sowing terror so there’s a noticeable lack of suspense or engagement with the proceedings from there. If you already know the twist is the buildup to the other characters finally catching up to the omniscient narrative worth the investment? I didn’t think so and found myself routinely bored waiting for Maureen O’Hara’s ever watchful Mary to figure out what I already knew an hour prior.
If we learned in the end, as was Hitchcock’s original intent, that Pengallan was the string puller behind these events, then his gentlemanly pretentions and nouveau riche trappings would take on grander textures of villainy. We are always aware that he is the deceitful kingpin so everything Laughton does becomes something of a camp artifice and there’s no surprise, suspense, or reason to invest in his scheming. We know that O’Hara will eventually pull back the curtain on his greed and ego from the beginning, so their battle of wills is lopsided throughout.
Yet not nearly as lopsided as Hitchcock and Laughton’s aims. Hitchcock is clearly striving for atmosphere while Laughton undoes that aim with his theatrical pompousness, including a strange gait that seems attuned to a music only he can hear. Author Daphne du Maurier nearly considered withholding the film rights to Rebecca as she was so disappointed with this adaptation of her material. Thank god she conceded as that film is one of Hitchcock’s great masterworks, the first of a string of them during his Hollywood years.
