Number Seventeen (Number 17) poster & wallpaper

Ann Casson, Anne Grey, Barry Jones

A gang of thieves gather at a safe house following a robbery, but a detective is on their trail.

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34% liked it

1,159 ratings

Unrated, 63 min.

Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock

Release Date: January 1, 1932

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Flixster Reviews (71)

  • McKittrick
    June 17, 2008
    McKittrick
    "Coo blimey, if it ain't my lucky day! I'm a murderer, I'm a liar and now I'm a b-bathroom fitting!"
    Number Seventeen is criminally under-rated! Point out the plot-holes, shaky camera, toy town special effects and ropy acting and you are SO missing the point. 17 is meant as a com...( read more)ic parody of the spy story (with a large dose of The Cat and the Canary thrown in for good measure).Who cares about the plot flaws and ropy acting when everyone is having such a lark - including Hitch - literally like a child playing with his toy set! I really enjoy this more than the generally more revered Murder and Blackmail (so the acting in those films isn't ropy??).
    It's quite a surreal and odd little film - for the first half of the film people seem to keep appearing and then disappearing again at such an alarming rate it's hard to keep up with who's who - but that's part of it's charm (even in the last few minutes more identities are being revealed!). At just over an hour it manages to cram in many of the elements we have come to recognise as Hitchcockian: staircases (lots of them!), the 'bad' girl done good, handcuffs and bondage, trains and chases on trains, bathrooms, people not being what they seem (who are the villains and the heroes?), a macguffin (the necklace) and of course the darkness and light of German expressionism (this one oozes it). It's no masterpiece but it's certainly not the dud it's dismissed as.
  • ceWEBrity
    December 28, 2007
    ceWEBrity
    I wouldn't call this a complete disaster, but I guess even the masters have to start somewhere...Hitchcock totally lost me on this one. Number 17 is full of atmosphere, has a neat setting, and bubbles with black-and-white charm, but the plot doesn't make any sense at all. I had t...( read more)rouble hearing the characters because of the sound, which isn't really Hitchcock's fault, but it made the storyline even harder to follow. And the acting is ass.

    This was obviously just a fun little bauble for Hitchcock to kick around. He plays around a lot with light, shadow and sound in the movie; clearly honing his grasp of the atmospheric. I think I read somewhere that he made this movie just to fund Rich and Strange, and I believe it. Valuable only as a curio for die-hard Hitchcock fans.
  • stopitgoaway
    August 10, 2007
    stopitgoaway
    NUMBER SEVENTEEN is one of the very few films Alfred Hitchcock made that has aged poorly. It's bizarre to find a movie he made that doesn't improve on a second viewing; even JAMAICA INN and THE SKIN GAME get better the more you look at them. Here's an unfortunate exception. While...( read more) it doesn't lack merit as a rollicking little caper, the story is too confusing for the film to be enjoyed, and surprisingly enough the direction is clumsy and the whole thing ends up rather incoherent.

    There may be a reason for this. Hitchcock made this in a hurry to get to a project he was eager to work on, RICH AND STRANGE, one of his most offbeat and personal films (actually released before this one). As a result, this very short and very stagy little comedy/thriller feels like the work of someone who didn't really care. While this is something that rarely happens in his catalog as director, you can sense the same thing to a lesser extent in STAGE FRIGHT and THE SKIN GAME, yet the technical competence of the former and the fine source material and performances of the latter make those more fun and interesting to see than this.

    The real crime here is witnessing the failure of one of Hitch's only stabs at an old-dark-house mystery; it's a severe disappointment that he didn't explore the potential of the story to a greater degree. NUMBER SEVENTEEN is locked into its time and doesn't have anything close to the resonance of BLACKMAIL. To a fan of the director, it's essential but a bit off-putting.

    One good point is the closing chase sequence, which takes up a major chunk of the movie's second half (the total running time is only an hour). Despite the obvious use of miniatures, it's amusing to see the director play with buildup and action in an otherwise dismal effort
  • g0y
    October 3, 2009
    g0y
    The DVD transfer is cheap and the hiss was often louder than characters' voices. Plus, some of the characters have thick accents - plus, there were no subtitles available. So I missed a buncha plot details which are always essential in any film especially one of Hitchcock's. Stil...( read more)l, the setting in the house was at least atmospheric (though a little clunkily directed) and the comedy is so dated to the point where it's recycled and chuckle worthy. Interesting characters and more or less good actors for them. The climax would be palpable with good production; or, filmed a couple of years later when the technology didn't reduce filming miniature trains and buses.
  • Firefightrix
    January 6, 2009
    Firefightrix
    The Hitchcock Collection DVD
  • Ghw12158
    September 1, 2008
    Ghw12158
    reminds me of "resevoir dogs"
  • leerudman
    June 30, 2008
    leerudman
    This film didn't start off very well. The acting was poor and there seemed to be a completely incoherent story.



    However after the first 10 minutes were over,Hitchcock had somehow managed to pull together an interesting plot from nowhere which has a fair few twist...( read more)s and turns. The film becomes a very good parody of mystery films. Although this is obviously nowhere near Hitchcock's best, its really worth watching
  • bjaccobs
    December 25, 2007
    bjaccobs
    An entertaining early Hitchcock thriller.
  • evermich2005
    April 3, 2007
    evermich2005
    a gang of thieves gather on a safe house following a roberry but a detective is on their trail
  • iommifanatic
    March 20, 2007
    iommifanatic
    Ok, but almost unwatchable.

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