Alfred Hitchcock’s seventh film as a director was this pleasant little British comedy. And while a few of Hitchcock’s better-known films have comic elements to them — such as The Trouble with Harry (1955) and the black Family Plot (1976) — and Hitchcock was well known to have a wry sense of humor, the thought of a Hitchcock comedy will make many film buffs stop and ponder the incongruousness of a suspense master directing a light drawing-room comedy.

In the silent era, when he was just starting his tremendous film career, Hitchcock was something of a utility director. A small number of his silent films were love triangle films, others were dramas of manners. Only one, The Lodger (1926), was an indication of the suspense master Hitchcock was to come. Hitchcock’s next thriller was his first sound film and his tenth film as director, 1929’s Blackmail.

An English farmer (Jameson Thomas), a man of good means, has been recently widowed. At the marriage of his daughter, the farmer begins entertaining the idea of wedding again. With the help of his housemaid, he considers his local marriage options and creates a list of potential brides. Armed with his considerable arrogance and a farmer’s practicality, he begins ‘courting’ his future brides. After a small number of comic rebuffs, the farmer is thoroughly discouraged. His quest continues through the support of his housemaid (Lilian Hall-Davis), much to the consternation of the farm’s coarse and uncouth main man, Gordon Harker as Churdles Ash. The Farmer’s Wife is a pleasant little story that grows on the viewer over multiple viewings. — Carl Bennett

Of this edition, the first to appear on DVD but far from the only home video version, we can say that it could have been better but is probably still worth the low cost to own. The material utilized for the video transfer appears to be a good 35mm print or a very-good 16mm print, and the transfer runs at a proper speed.

Some speckling and some print flaws are visible throughout the film. Some compression artifacts are visible in some flat light-to-middle graytones on both standard and HD monitors. At times, picture jitter can be distracting. The video transfer can be described overall as uneven. While some shots are quite pleasing, with good middle graytones and good picture detail, highlights are a little hot in places and shadow details are plugged up by too much print or transfer contrast. And while most of the picture framing is open, some intertitles (and the cast credits) will be cropped off on some televisions and are sometimes too dark to read. Hand-written identification numbers written in ink on the negative used to strike the print show up as large white distractions throughout the film. From the third reel, cropping feels tighter as some heads are cropped off at the top of the frame. Glitches in the video master used for the digital transfer mar the second half of the film.

The music score for this DVD edition has been cobbled together from various canned sources. Taped orchestral music has been combined with 78 RPM records and edited into a serviceable soundtrack that is as varied in quality as is the video picture. Some thought was put into the sequencing and the music does help to convey mood. A vocal recording was intelligently chosen to accompany a scene that features a men’s glee club.

Altogether, we still prefer and recommend the out-of-print Republic Pictures Home Video VHS videotape version of The Farmer’s Wife as the best version currently available. While the videotape has no soundtrack at all, the picture material is consistently of very good quality, being taken from a 35mm print source. The Laserlight DVD version is serviceable and will probably still be the version of choice of those collectors who adamantly prefer DVD over videotape.

USA: Click the logomark at right to purchase a Region 1 NTSC DVD of this edition from Amazon.com.
Canada: Click the logomark at right to purchase a Region 1 NTSC DVD of this edition from Amazon.ca.

Our first look at this budget collection of Hitchcock films reveals a good full-frame video transfer of a very-good 16mm reduction print, only to have it compromised by a cheaply-manufactured disc that is marred by a higher-than-usual number of video master playback glitches.

The quality is pretty much a push compared to the Laserlight edition noted above, neither being ideal but merely passable.

USA: Click the logomark at right to purchase a Region 0 NTSC DVD of this edition from Amazon.com.
Canada: Click the logomark at right to purchase a Region 0 NTSC DVD of this edition from Amazon.ca.

Other silent era Alfred Hitchcock films available on DVD home video:
Blackmail (1929)
Champagne (1928)
Easy Virtue (1927)
The Lodger (1926)
The Manxman (1929)
The Ring (1927)

Other British silent era films available on DVD home video:
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1912-1921)
A Cottage on Dartmoor (1929)
Electric Edwardians: The Lost Films of Mitchell & Kenyon (1900-1906)
Hindle Wakes (1927)
The Informer (1929)
Livingstone (1925)
Moulin Rouge (1928)
Piccadilly (1929)
The Return of the Rat (1929)
The Woman He Scorned (1929)