Made just after Pearl Harbor and the American entry into the war, Hitchcock's rarely shown Saboteur is a wartime story which climaxes, incredibly, atop the Statue of Liberty, where a hunted Nazi agent hangs by his coat sleeve. One by one, the stitches give way.... “Every second in this final thrill is prolonged, but the real Hitchcock touch lies in the paradox. It's absurd, but it grips; it's melodramatic, but the whole incredible event has been witnessed by a huddle of tourists who gape as we do” (William Whitebait).
Robert Cummings stars as a factory worker framed on a sabotage charge after the plant catches fire. His pursuit of the real saboteurs, and the police's pursuit of him, lead him and heroine Priscilla Lane into a host of imaginative settings and situations, including a shoot-out in a cinema, an encounter with a freak show troupe, and a fashionable ball at which the couple appear in street clothes and dance as if their lives depend on it, which they do. The double chase and several of the situations echo previous Hitchcock films, adding a twist of parody to the film's spectacular effects, all directed with the usual Hitchcock virtuosity.