The Wrong Man

Released Dec 22, 1956

1 hr. 45 min.

Crime

Drama

List

93%

27 Reviews

Tomatometer

75%

5,000+ Ratings

Audience Score

Musician Manny Balestrero (Henry Fonda) needs money to pay for his wife Rose's (Vera Miles) dental procedure. When he tries to borrow money from their insurance policy, someone at the office mistakes him for a man who had robbed them twice at gunpoint. After Manny is arrested, his defense attorney, Frank O'Connor (Anthony Quayle), works to demonstrate that Manny has an alibi for the crimes. The stress of the case, however, threatens to destroy Manny's family before his name can be cleared.

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Jeff S

Chilling. Hitchcock effectively illustrates how a little bad luck and some strange coincidences can create unthinkable circumstances. Especially chilling is the meandering journey Vera Miles takes before plunging into a dark world of her own design.

Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

02/13/24

Full Review

Patricia N

Hitchcock's eerie Sleeper.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

09/27/23

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steve d

Surprisingly little there besides the cast.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Hitchcock at his best. I hope nothing like that ever happens to me!

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

02/10/23

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Green G

Hitchcock's most underrated movie. Frustrating at times, but brilliant overall.

Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

08/29/21

Full Review

William L

The Wrong Man starts out strongly, establishing a 'falsely accused man' premise that Hitchcock had employed several times before; if you consider the plot in the broader context of a protagonist simply running from a misunderstanding that has spiraled out of control, the similarities become even more clear. It feels like a more suspenseful take on the second half of Sullivan's Travels, featuring a man caught in the gears of a legal system that cares less for justice and humanity than it does for quotas. In that depiction, Hitchcock is brilliant, creating a scenario that feels chillingly plausible - a case of mistaken identity in suburban America that leads to disaster, where a bank visit and a walk home turns into a cascading series of events that ends in prison, with a path greased by unfulfilled promises from police officers and the general trusting nature of Fonda's Manny. It's an unusual turn for the director, given his avowed love of less-than-grounded premises (instead of Cary Grant getting shot at from a plane in a cornfield or Jimmy Stewart navigating the bazaars of Africa), but it's a welcome one. The scene in which Manny is first 'recognized' is great, with a series of bank employees attempting to warn each other of their customer while giving the appearance of conducting ordinary business. Where the film goes wrong is in its strange diversion of its focus; it loses momentum after Fonda's release from prison is secured, by transitioning to both a relatively typical legal drama but also by introducing a bizarre and totally unnecessary subplot in the mental breakdown of Miles' Rose. It's supposed to flesh out the characters and the impact that such accusations could have on an otherwise serene family, but it comes out of nowhere with a sense of the unbelievable - her mental break coincides with a series of laughably unlucky investigations like everybody that Manny encountered over the course of a vacation ending up dead a few months later by sheer coincidence. I mean, the film tries to give the full jump-cut, critical moment treatment to Vera Miles slightly hitting Henry Fonda with a hairbrush. Strong opening, well-acted, and sloppy finish, but the least believable part? When the cops recognized their mistake and took steps to fix it. And to have the tone of the ending totally flipped by written narration before the credits? Yikes. (3/5)

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

06/12/21

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Alfred Hitchcock

Director

Henry Fonda

Manny Balestrero

Vera Miles

Rose Balestrero

Anthony Quayle

Frank O'Connor

Harold J. Stone

Lt. Bowers

Esther Minciotti

Mama Balestrero

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Brandon Judell

indieWire

[O]ne of the master's must overlooked offerings. . . . But Henry Fonda's performance as the accused and our own current events keep this Wrong Man very pertinent. (Be aware the studios forced a happy coda onto the feature.)

Jun 15, 2021

Full Review

Richard Brody

New Yorker

Hitchcock's ultimate point evokes cosmic terror: innocence is merely a trick of paperwork, whereas guilt is the human condition.

Jun 29, 2015

Full Review

A.H. Weiler

New York Times

Frighteningly authentic, the story generates only a modicum of drama.

Rated: 2.5/5

Mar 25, 2006

Full Review

Jean-Luc Godard

Cahiers du Cinéma

With each shot, each transition, each composition, Hitchcock does the only thing possible for the rather paradoxical but compelling reason that he could do anything he liked. "Che sera, sera," because What Will Be Has Been.

Apr 4, 2022

Full Review

Mike Massie

Gone With The Twins

In its efforts to be comprehensive about the proceedings, educating audiences who might not know the ins and outs of a run-in with the law, the pacing isn't always tight.

Rated: 6/10

Aug 23, 2020

Full Review

Clyde Gilmour

Maclean's Magazine

Director Alfred Hitchcock forsakes his usual shivers-and-giggles formula to produce a piece of glum honest realism closely based on an actual case.

Nov 5, 2019

Full Review

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Synopsis

Musician Manny Balestrero (Henry Fonda) needs money to pay for his wife Rose's (Vera Miles) dental procedure. When he tries to borrow money from their insurance policy, someone at the office mistakes him for a man who had robbed them twice at gunpoint. After Manny is arrested, his defense attorney, Frank O'Connor (Anthony Quayle), works to demonstrate that Manny has an alibi for the crimes. The stress of the case, however, threatens to destroy Manny's family before his name can be cleared.

Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Screenwriter: Maxwell Anderson, Angus MacPhail
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
Production Co: Warner Bros.
Genre: Crime, Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Dec 22, 1956, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Oct 4, 2016
Sound Mix: Mono
Aspect Ratio: 35mm

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