I Confess

A priest (Montgomery Clift) refuses to divulge information he heard in confession, leading to a police inspector (Karl Malden) charging him with a murder he didn’t commit.

I Confess is a somewhat disappointing thriller from director Alfred Hitchcock. While the cast is fine, the script lacks bite and fails to rise above its melodramatic premise.

Part of the problem is that the characters are all very thin. Montgomery Clift is fine as the lead, but he doesn’t have much to do. His character has no real arc, and he begins the film more or less where he started. Anne Baxter has a richer role, but it’s still lacking, Karl Malden at least has fun with his role as a typical hard-line police inspector, and O.E. Hasse is suitably slimy as the villain.

But where’s the suspense? Where are the thrills in this thriller? There’s a lot of back-story involving Clift and Baxter’s characters that would have paid off a lot more if it were Baxter’s character on trial instead of Clift’s. Then he’d be faced with the less black and white decision of allowing Baxter’s character to take the fall for a crime he knew she didn’t commit, versus him taking blame himself.

Ultimately, I Confess is all setup and no payoff. While Hitchcock may have found the premise compelling, he fails to exploit it in a way that justifies the 95-minute investment. It’s not an awful film, just an underwhelming one.