Rent Champagne (1928)

Hitch gets lost. - Champagne review by Steve

This is a silent screwball comedy about a feckless it-girl  taught a lesson by her rich father who pretends to have lost the lot on the stock exchange, so she has to get a job! Alfred Hitchcock might not quite have the Lubitsch touch, but it is pleasant enough frou-frou with a couple of real laughs.

The English actor Betty Balfour plays the American heiress in France and she is the big weakness. The former revue artist was only 25 but already looks too matronly for the role and lacks the star charisma of Clara Bow who was making this sort of jazz babe comedy in Hollywood.

Gordon Harker takes the acting honours as her crafty dad, a Wall Street high roller. Which was not the sort of part he played after the coming of sound! Hitchcock was seen by British International Pictures as a comedy director and they refused to allow the Master to develop his own ideas.

There is little of his trademark style. The best is  a point of view shot of a pair of tango dancers seen through a glass of... champagne. The film wasn't a success, though it isn't bad by the standards of British silents. But something had to give.