Suspicion

Many classics of Chinese cinema’s “Second Golden Age” retell narratives from Chinese history or then-contemporary political struggles; 1948’s Suspicion stands out, though, as an example of a populist work that looked to foreign films, specifically Hollywood, for inspiration. Borrowing the title of Hitchcock’s thriller, Xu Changlin fashioned a similarly claustrophobic tale of a husband and wife slowly consumed by paranoia. Just returned from the war, a veteran soon grows doubtful as to his wife’s loyalty; the wife, however, has a bitterness of her own. Combining traditional melodrama with the psychological thriller, noir aesthetics, and a poetic voice-over narration, Suspicion offers up multiple surprises.