One of Alfred Hitchcock‘s more effervescent cinematic cocktails, 1955’s To Catch a Thief is a must-watch for any cinephile or aspiring bon vivant. A gentleman can learn many lessons from the impossibly stylish Cary Grant as reformed (or is he?) jewelry thief and hero of the French Resistance, John Robie, aka “The Cat”. Grant’s Robie comes under renewed suspsicion when a series of high profile, high value robberies plague the glitterati of the French Riviera. His old war buddies, with whom he escaped from a bombed out prison, soon turn on him for fear of having their paroles revoked, leading Robie to endeavor to find out who the new “Cat” is before the police pin it on him or his old mates do him in to save themselves. Added to the heady mix is the lucious Grace Kelly in her prime as prim but sexy nouveau riche debutante Frances Stevens, determined to share in the excitement of “The Cat’s” criminal exploits and capture the uniquely intriguing Robie for her own pleasure.
Filmed largely on location in Nice, Cannes and Monaco, To Catch a Thief looks as stunning today as it must have when it was released if not more so because the coast and the Principality had not yet been so frantically overdeveloped. The helicopter shots of high speed drives through Mediterranean hills and villages are breathtaking. And the teasing rapport between the ultra-tan, ultra-suave Grant and the golden, precocious Kelly is pure cinema magic. It’s no wonder that Grant, along with James Stewart, was one of Hitchcock’s favorite male leads. They did four remarkably good films together — Suspicion, Notorious, Thief and North by Northwest — and Hitch was always able to coax the dark shadows of Grant’s sometimes glib personality to the fore. For the Master of Suspense, he was willing to reveal his weakness and even his unattractive side and if you know only the smiling playboy caricature of Grant you’ll be in for a treat watching any of those classic collaborations. One of the unquestionable cinema greats, Grant’s body of work for Hitchcock alone would put him near the top of any list of all-time best movie actors.
And as is well documented, Hitchcock was enraptured by Kelly as his ultimate cool blond with hot blood. After making three terrific films for Hitch in quick succession — Dial M for Murder, Rear Window and Thief — Kelly married Prince Ranier in 1956 and retired from movies to be the Princess Consort of Monaco. While the great director quipped that he was “very happy that Grace has found herself such a good part” he was in fact bereft and struggled in vain to find a new version of her in subsequent films. Hence he has Kim Novak with Stewart in Vertigo, Eva Marie Saint with Grant in North by Northwest, Janet Leigh in Psycho and Tippi Hedren in The Birds and Marnie. While all those actresses did admirable work in their own way, especially the very touching and tragic Kim Novak in Vertigo, it’s no doubt that Hitchcock would have preferred Grace Kelly in all of those roles. After watching her take Grant on a white knuckle ride through the hills of Monaco before stopping to picnic and slyly offering him the choice of a leg or a breast, it’s easy to see why. The fact that Princess Grace was killed in a car accident in 1982 at the age of 52 in those very same cliffs just adds a layer of poignancy to the near-perfection of To Catch a Thief.
