The film plays out with utterly charming merriment, which is assisted every step of the way by the acting of the sparkling cast. The characters may be naive, but they are adorably beguiling, and the tale bounces to a satisfying conclusion.

| Jan 8, 2023

In a career littered with experiments that succeed to different degrees, this is one that really worked.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Jun 24, 2022

The color is artfully wonderful: fall shades disclose a poetry that offers a mischievous contrast to the gruesome text and action.

| Apr 4, 2022

It doesn't come off because even the little touches are done badly.

| Feb 3, 2021

Hitchcock is reluctant to follow the subversive premises of the story through to their outrageous logical conclusion.

| May 5, 2020

Sprightly is the word for Hitchcock's direction; neither moral nor gruesome, neither childish nor yet quite adult, neither in the world nor quite outside it, it gives the impression of taking you straight into a peculiarly vivid dream.

| May 5, 2020

Alfred Hitchcock's 1955 comedy has long been overshadowed by the masterworks that surround it, but it's a wonderful, fanciful film, the most optimistic movie he ever made -- a fairy tale among nightmares.

| May 5, 2020

The acting is perfection, with MacLaine (in her debut) quite wonderful, and Hitchcock was mighty proud of this adaptation of Jack Trevor Story's novel, always naming it among his personal favourites.

| Original Score: 5/5 | May 5, 2020

Assimilating the black humours of the comedie noire into the gentler comedy of village eccentricity, Hitchcock and his scriptwriter, John Michael Hayes, have concocted an entertainment insidious in its charm.

| Apr 28, 2020

The film, a radical departure for the director, is one of his most forgotten, and it's also one of his best, a night-black portrait of small-town New England nonchalance and charm.

| Sep 13, 2019

One of the absolute funniest movies of the 1950s, not least because it is perhaps the most puckish.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Sep 15, 2013

A spirited irreverence about the power of death pervades. Think of this as a relief valve compared to most of Hitchcock's other films.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 27, 2011

This is a blithe little comedy, produced and directed with affection by Alfred Hitchcock, about a bothersome corpse that just can't stay buried.

| Jul 6, 2010

I love it. I've seen it more times than just about any other Hitchcock.

| May 16, 2008

This latest of Mr. Hitchcock's efforts is a curiously whimsical thing.

| Mar 25, 2006

A quiet, picturesque Vermont autumn, its leaves in full color, provides the setting for this splendid Hitchcock black comedy.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Feb 9, 2006

highly entertaining romantic comedy that still has the Hitchcock touch--a dark comedy using a dead body as the central MacGuffin

| Original Score: B- | Feb 6, 2006

Beautifully subtle suspense with a sprinkle of black humor.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5 | Dec 12, 2005

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 12, 2004

It's not helped by the wooden performances of the leads.

| Original Score: C | May 22, 2004