The 39 Steps, June 6, 1935
Mr Alfred Hitchcock’s treatment of the story gives us a first-rate film of adventure edged with comedy . . . Its climax verges upon ingenuity of the kind that we resent, but by the time it has been reached we have been much too well entertained to think of resenting it.

The Lady Vanishes, October 10, 1938
[Hitchcock’s] touch has never been surer nor his power to hold our attention more complete . . . He loves all that is sinister and bizarre – murder, espionage and crime – and as a teller of such stories he has no equal in cinema . . . A name scrawled on a pane of glass, a nun wearing high-heeled shoes, the wrapping from a packet of tea – these are the things upon which his plot hinges. Never for a moment does this tension relax; it is all baffling, absorbing and extraordinarily exciting.

Sabotage, December 7, 1936
Mr Hitchcock concentrates so much on the building up of an atmosphere of suspense, with typical and rather too frequent expressions of Cockney humour, that he does not realise how much he is thinning that atmosphere by becoming absorbed in the timing and theatrical mechanics of the bomb.

The Man Who Knew Too Much, December 10, 1934
Mr Alfred Hitchcock has a rare gift for the macabre. With the aid of a few shadows, a dozen stairs or so, and a sinister-looking figure, he manages to keep his audience in a suspended state of expectation.

Secret Agent, May 11, 1936
[Hitchcock’s] sagacity in choosing Mr Peter Lorre for the part of the killer is rewarded by Mr Lorre’s performance . . . He is a man of two passions – he can cut a man’s throat and make love to a woman with a professional indifference which leaves no sense of the incongruous.

Jamaica Inn, May 15, 1939
It is a film of downright, and in no way subtle, action.

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