The Wrong Man offers hope, faith, and optimism

Famed director and master of suspense Alfred Hitchcock was born 117 years ago on Aug. 13, 1899. Over the span of his six-decade career, Hitchcock brought innumerable innovations to film, producing some of the most famous and well-regarded movies ever made.

But Hitchcock’s 50-odd-film output is so vast, more than a few of his movies have for some reason or another gone undervalued. One such film is his 1956 docudrama, The Wrong Man.

While not his first film inspired by an actual event (1948’s Rope was earlier), it was the first time in quite a while that Hitchcock worked on such a small-scale emotional story—a fact that Hitchcock himself announces in a filmed prologue.

The movie tells the story of Manny Balestrero (Henry Fonda), a man who is—more importantly than anything else—a husband and father. During a routine stop at the bank to take out a loan for his wife Rose (Vera Miles), he is mistakenly identified as a man who had earlier robbed the bank. This leads to a string of events in which Manny is questioned, imprisoned, tried, and forced to prove his innocence for a crime he did not commit.

Unlike many other true-crime films of this era, such as 1948’s Call Northside 777 or 1947’s Boomerang, Hitchcock made the bold decision not to tell the story from the perspective of a police officer or someone who was investigating the crime. Instead, every incomprehensible incident unfolds from Manny’s everyman point of view.

This is easily the movie’s most masterful merit. Through his choices in camera placement, Hitchcock continuously forces the viewer to see things through Manny’s eyes. For example, in a scene in which Manny is accosted by police officers and seated in their car, he glances at the officer on his left. The policeman’s profile fills the frame, blocking Manny’s view of the outside world. Manny next looks to his right as a similar shot appears. He then peeks behind him to see his house and the familiar bustle of the neighborhood. Even if it is not understood what is being communicated on a conscious level, it is felt. Nothing in Manny’s world changed, except for himself—and against his will.

This is where Hitchcock’s trademark “suspense” comes to the forefront. The creeping horror of what has happened to Manny is nigh unbearable. Despite some assurance in the prologue that he must have been found innocent at some point, the nail-biting majority of the film leaves viewers questioning whether or not Manny can be freed of his predicament—or if such a thing could happen to them.

Much of what makes this movie endurable is the presence of Henry Fonda. His simplistic and truthful portrayal of a man confronted with an unfathomable scenario surely ranks among his best performances. Fonda underplays the character beautifully, depicting his confusion and despair with an unexpected kind of optimism and honesty.

Fonda’s performance becomes especially apparent as the hopelessness of the second half of The Wrong Man culminates in one of the most staggeringly hopeful scenes Hitchcock ever committed to celluloid. Such a scene ought to be experienced rather than described, but suffice it to say, it brings Manny’s underlying faith in God, something that had only been hinted at up to that point, to the forefront.

The scene is atypical in Hitchcock’s filmography, considering his (acknowledged) penchant for the macabre, yet The Wrong Man is also atypical among Hitchcock films. Despite the crushing mood of futility throughout the movie, the ultimate message is clearly one of hope, faith, and optimism. The movie provides viewers with the ideal that miracles can—and will—happen, if only given a little time. A statement just as important now as it was upon the film’s initial release.

The Wrong Man is available on DVD and Blu-ray from Warner Home Video.