The Lodger

While ‘The Lodger’ was not director Alfred Hitchcock’s first film, it was the first to truly deserve the designation “A Hitchcock Picture”. British matinee idol Ivor Novello plays Jonathan Drew, a quiet, secretive young man who rents a room in a London boarding house. Drew’s arrival coincides with the reign of terror orchestrated by Jack the Ripper. As the film progresses, circumstantial evidence begins to mount, pointing to Drew as the selfsame Ripper. In the original story by Mrs Belloc-Lownes, suspicions concerning Drew were confirmed; but Ivor Novello was a star of the first magnitude, and stars of the first magnitude just didn’t play murderers back in 1926. Thus, we learn at the last possible moment that Drew is innocent, and is in fact on the trail of the Ripper himself. Hitchcock makes his cameo appearance at a desk in the newsroom early in the film. Some people claim he also appears later in the crowd watching the arrest. Hitchcock wanted an ambiguous ending to the film, but the studio wouldn’t allow it to be implied that Ivor Novello might actually be the murderer.