Its thoroughly American origin, atmosphere, and elements he certainly knew thoroughly, its derivation from paint-by-numbers pulp murder mysteries, its hard-boiled loner super-masculine detective and femme fatale and plot that will only end in tears (or a cynical laugh). This was his donnee for the film, its generative spark, the “thought” he “loved.” Noir gave Hitchcock a set of conventions to play with- and against. His daughter, Patricia, said it was “because he loved the thought of bringing menace into a small town.” For Hitchcock, part of the game in making his first movie set in America was to make it absolutely American, with a sweet comic surface and a heart as dark as the noirest of the noir. The result is an exciting and highly realistic film, whose new set cost, mainly for studio replicas, was well under the imposed limit.On at least four different occasions, Alfred Hitchcock said that “Shadow of a Doubt” (1943) was his favorite film, but never why. 13,000), Hitchcock with his cast and crew took over the entire city for four weeks, converted it into a complete motion-picture studio. Instead of building a studio version of a typical American city, his main setting, he searched for a ready-made one. Instead of elaborate sets he used the real thing. Accustomed to spending more than $100,000 on sets alone for one picture, Hitchcock made Shadow Of A Doubt by reverting to the 'location shooting' of early movie days.

LIFE magazine ran an extensive feature on the film's production in their January 1943 edition:Īs a director of one of the first movies to be produced under the Government restriction placing a $5,000 ceiling on new materials used for sets, has shown he has more than one trick up his sleeve.

Writer Thornton Wilder accompanied Hitchcock on a trip to the town in June 1942 so that they could incorporate local landmarks and buildings into the screenplay. Shadow of a Doubt was mostly filmed on location in Santa Rosa, California, during August 1942.

Shadow of a doubt movie