Summary
As they get ready to sit down for dinner, Mr. Kentley apologizes to Brandon on David’s behalf. Brandon responds, “Well he’s only here for the weekend, Mr. Kentley, and David is a popular young man.” Janet serves some of the chicken, and Phillip takes some for Mrs. Atwater. When he doesn’t want any chicken for himself, Janet is bemused, calling it “queer” and asking him why he doesn’t eat chicken. “I just don’t,” he tells her, but Janet insists that “Freud says there’s a reason for everything.” Phillip insists that there’s no reason, but Mr. Cadell remembers that there’s a very interesting reason that Phillip doesn’t eat chicken, and Brandon tells the whole group the story of Phillip’s distaste for chicken: Three years ago, at Brandon’s mother’s house in Connecticut, they went to a nearby farm to get a chicken to eat for dinner, and Phillip was wringing the chickens’ necks. On this particular day, Phillip had been too delicate with the neck of one chicken, which rose, still alive, from the dinner table. Phillip becomes anxious and indignant, yelling, “That’s a lie!” as Mr. Cadell looks at him with a concerned expression.
Brandon and Phillip argue about the validity of the chicken story. Janet laughs about the intensity of their argument, and Mr. Cadell watches them with a look of concern. Brandon apologizes for their argument and for the story. As he walks over to Phillip, Mr. Cadell jokes that had they not settled their fight about the chicken, they may have started strangling each other. Mr. Cadell then launches into a monologue about the number of reasons someone might murder, and Janet teases him, saying, “You don’t really approve of murder, Rupert, if I may.” However, Mr. Cadell insists that he does approve of murder, as he sits down beside a smiling Mrs. Atwater. Murder would improve so many things, he insists: unemployment, poverty, standing in line for theater tickets. When Mrs. Atwater takes this opportunity to discuss the difficulties that she’s had in procuring theater tickets recently, Cadell launches into a jokey role-play, describing all of the wonderful things Mrs. Atwater would be enabled to do, if she only resorted to murder.
The guests laugh at Mr. Cadell’s over-the-top performance, his endorsement of murder as a tactic for a better life. Mrs. Atwater goes along with his scheme, saying “What a divine idea! If it suits your purpose, merely—" before catching herself as she realizes, “But then we’d all be murdering each other!” Here, Mr. Cadell insists that murder ought always to be an art, “and as such the privilege of committing it should be reserved for those few who really are superior individuals.” Here, Brandon chimes in, finishing the thought, saying, “And the victims, inferior beings whose lives are unimportant anyway.” Mr. Cadell continues to speak glibly about murder, making Mrs. Atwater laugh, and Mr. Kentley chimes in, suggesting that he doesn’t appreciate the group’s “morbid humor.” Mr. Kentley cannot believe that the men are serious about their idea that murder is acceptable when committed by superior individuals.
Mr. Kentley asks who gets to decide who is inferior and who is superior, to which Brandon quickly responds, “The few who are privileged to commit murder.” Kentley asks him who those people are, and Brandon looks around the room. According to him, he himself, Phillip, and “possibly Rupert” are all superior and entitled to commit acts of murder. Brandon becomes increasingly indignant, suggesting that “good and evil” and “right and wrong” were made for the average man and not for the “intellectually and culturally superior” men in society. Mr. Kentley then suggests that this sounds like the Nietzschean concept of the “superman,” a concept which mobilized Hitler and the Holocaust. Brandon denounces Hitler, however, suggesting that Hitler was a savage, and killed unconscionably, without any justifiable claims to superiority. Mr. Kentley still does not approve of the conversation, and scolds Brandon and Cadell for their “contempt” for civilized society. Brandon fires back that the notion of “civilization” is hypocritical. Mr. Kentley becomes impatient, and asks to drop the matter.
Mr. Cadell takes this opportunity to ask where the books are laid out for Mr. Kentley, and Phillip tells him that they are in the dining room. Mr. Kentley is silent and upset in this moment, so Brandon apologizes to him, as Phillip asks if he would like to take a look at the books on the dining table. Mr. Kentley accepts Brandon’s apology, patting him on the arm, before asking to use the telephone to call Mrs. Kentley and ask after David. As he goes, Mr. Cadell confronts Brandon about his passionate endorsement of murder, asking if he plans to commit murder himself. Brandon jokes, “I am a creature of whim, who knows.” Brandon then asks Mrs. Atwater if she would like to look at the books, an invitation she enthusiastically accepts. Leaving Kenneth and Janet alone in the living room, Brandon suggests that Kenneth play some atmospheric music, which will go a “long way.” After Brandon has left the room, Janet fumes that he is being a “sly little devil, bringing us back together again, with sweet music.” Kenneth smiles and tells her not to worry.
Kenneth and Janet engage in an intimate conversation. When Janet says she is going to confront Brandon instead of spending time with Kenneth, Kenneth asks why she cares so much what Brandon thinks. She tells him that Brandon has suggested that she left Kenneth for David because David has a bigger bank account. We then learn that it was in fact Kenneth who broke up with Janet, not the other way around. When Kenneth stops speaking for a moment, Janet asks him what he is thinking about, to which he responds, “female vanity.” Janet expresses embarrassment about the fact that now that she and David are together, David and Kenneth aren’t very good friends. Kenneth doesn’t seem to mind, and Janet goes on to confess that David makes her feel very relaxed, and that on the day that Kenneth “called it quits” with her, David took her for a walk, and she didn’t feel the need to perform. She refers to these feelings as “the real real me stuff.” Growing suddenly self-conscious, she wonders where David is, and Kenneth stares at her romantically. When Kenneth asks Janet if she loves David, Janet hesitates, but says that she does, and Kenneth jokes about the fact that Brandon encouraged them to put on atmospheric music, which has influenced their conversation.
Kenneth then reveals that when he first arrived, Brandon had suggested that David was “out of the running” for Janet’s affections and that Kenneth might have a better shot with Janet that evening. Kenneth’s confession makes Janet realize that Brandon has known much more about her romantic life than he has let on, and she feels immediately betrayed. They both become indignant and annoyed at Brandon’s apparent deceptiveness, and Janet calls Brandon into the living room. She immediately confronts Brandon, urging him to “turn off the charm,” and tell her why he had the gall to tell Kenneth that he wouldn’t have to worry about David and Janet. Brandon feigns ignorance, saying that that’s not what he was saying, but Janet holds firm that he implied as much, and wants to know why. Here, Brandon makes a rather misogynistic comment, saying, “Some women are quite charming when they are angry. Unfortunately, you’re not.” Kenneth comes to Janet’s defense, when Janet becomes even more upset, proclaiming that she doesn’t think David is even coming; he is never this late, and in fact, he is never late at all. “I think you deliberately arranged it so that he wouldn’t come,” Janet says, but Brandon won’t tell her either way.
Janet and Kenneth both storm out of the room as Mr. Cadell enters carrying two dessert plates, and asks Brandon what’s gone wrong. Brandon has a disparaging evaluation of Janet, but stops short and suddenly asks Mr. Cadell, “What did you mean, ‘something gone wrong’?” Cadell clarifies that Brandon usually throws such successful parties, it seems unlikely that he should have something go wrong at this one, and that Janet seems to miss David. When Mr. Cadell says that he is beginning to miss David, himself, Brandon exits the room as Mrs. Wilson comes in and Mr. Cadell hands her a dessert. As Mr. Cadell and Mrs. Wilson walk around the room, she confides in him about what an unusual party it is, and how strangely both Phillip and Brandon have been acting all day. She tells Cadell that Brandon usually lets Mrs. Wilson prepare everything her own way, but tonight, he took control and was in a huge rush. As she goes on to detail that Brandon told her to take the “whole afternoon” to run her errands, with no explanation, the camera zooms in on Mr. Cadell, whose curiosity is piqued. Mrs. Wilson then tells Mr. Cadell that when she returned, Brandon and Phillip were “going at it, hammer and tongs.”
Cadell is clearly getting more and more curious, and wants to know why the two men were fighting, but Mrs. Wilson says she doesn’t know. She then bemoans the fact that at the end of the dinner, she will have to bring all the books back from the dining room and put them in the chest. Cadell wonders why they are using the chest as a serving surface, and Mrs. Wilson doesn’t know, expressing frustration that she had to move all the table settings out into the living room. Phillip comes into the room, where he sees Mrs. Wilson examining the chest and is visibly anxious. He approaches Mrs. Wilson and Mr. Cadell, suggesting that it’s much more convenient to serve in the living room, and that Mrs. Wilson should stick to her job and stop lecturing. “We did get up on the wrong side of the bed, didn’t we,” Mrs. Wilson whispers to herself, and she leaves the room as the camera zooms in on Mr. Cadell.
Phillip begins playing the piano, and Mr. Cadell approaches him to talk. “I seem to be in quite an embarrassing position. I seem to be the only one having a good time,” he tells Phillip. Mr. Cadell then asks him directly, “what’s going on?” Phillip continues to play, without answering. When Mr. Cadell asks him to answer the question, Phillip pretends not to have heard the question and we hear a siren outside. Mr. Cadell repeats the question about what’s going on, but Phillip responds straightforwardly, that they are simply having a party. Growing more and more frustrated, Phillip abruptly stops playing the piano and tells Mr. Cadell to just say what he means, and “stop playing crime and punishment.” Mr. Cadell urges Phillip to keep playing the piano, and when Phillip says he wants a drink, Cadell offers to get it for him. Carell pours Phillip a glass of brandy and says, “I wish I could come straight out with what I want to know. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything.”
As he hands Phillip his brandy, Phillip takes a sip as Mr. Cadell examines a metronome on the piano. “What do you suspect?” Phillip asks him, and Mr. Cadell asks where David is. When Phillip says he doesn’t know, Cadell suggests that Brandon knows, and when Phillip pretends to have no idea, Cadell becomes all the more suspicious. “What is Brandon trying to do with Janet and Kenneth?” asks Cadell, and Phillip laughs heartily, and insists that there is nothing going on. “You’re more than usually allergic to the truth Phillip. That’s the second time you haven’t told it,” Cadell says, switching the metronome on. Phillip asks what the first time was, and Cadell says that it was when Phillip denied having ever strangled a chicken. Phillip becomes defensive, but Cadell insists that he knows that Phillip has strangled a chicken before because he saw Phillip strangle a chicken at the farm about a year ago. “You’re quite a good chicken strangler as I recall,” he says, and Phillip backpedals, saying that Brandon’s story was untrue, but that he has indeed strangled chickens before. Cadell presses him as to why he lied and tries to get Phillip to confess what’s going on, as Phillip becomes more and more frustrated with the metronome.
Analysis
Hitchcock’s camera work consistently highlights the tension and terror of the suspenseful plot. While he also expertly shoots the lighthearted simultaneity and buzz of a small gathering, in the moments when things turn frightening, Hitchcock moves the camera in such a way as to heighten the tension. For instance, when Brandon tells the story of Phillip’s reason for not eating chicken, and the story gets grisly and unsettling, the camera slowly pans over to Phillip, who looks anxious and unsettled. The camera pans slowly, as if to highlight the fact that the viewer knows something that the characters do not, to show the guilt that Phillip feels, and the obvious parallels between his wringing the necks of chickens and the murder of David.
Another rather curious bit of photography that occurs in this section is the way that the camera settles on Mr. Cadell for a great deal of Phillip’s denial of the chicken story. Phillip vehemently denies having ever wrung the necks of any chickens, and we hear Janet laughing at the entire conversation. Rather than show these characters, however, the camera stays with Mr. Cadell, who watches the proceedings with a suspicious and curious smirk, at once bemused and puzzled. The camera stays on Mr. Cadell’s face longer than seems usual, and the viewer sees him evaluating the discussion with a keen interest. As we see James Stewart’s expressive face processing this strange moment of tension between Brandon and Phillip, we begin to see that perhaps their dinner might not go off without a hitch. The cracks in the hosts’ performance seem to register with their observant and clever house master.
In this section of the film, the philosophical angles of murder are discussed by the group. The viewer sees that it is Mr. Cadell who so firmly planted the notion of the “perfect murder” in Brandon and Phillip’s minds. The entire idea that murder is acceptable stems from a philosophical notion that certain people are superior to others, and that their superiority gives them the right to decide whether an inferior person should live or die. This notion is an interpretation of the Nietzschean idea of the “superman” who is exempted from the laws of man by his superior intellect, a perspective to which, as Mr. Kentley points out, Hitler subscribed. In the moment that Cadell begins to expand on his ideas, we can see that it was he who planted his own dangerous megalomaniacal ideations in Phillip and Brandon at school, and that his notion of the superior man is a dangerous, violent, and inhumane one. While the other guests laugh at his pontifications, Mr. Kentley calls it out, suggesting that it is presumptuous and grandiose to imagine that anyone can judge who deserves to live and who deserves to die.
The private moment between Kenneth and Janet in this section of the film is an unusual one, and their conversation takes many turns. In the absence of David—just as Brandon suspected—it does seem that the former lovers have a great deal of intimacy and chemistry, but we also learn something Brandon doesn’t know: that it was Kenneth who left Janet, rather than the other way around, and that Janet has a deep fondness for David, that he brings out what she thinks of as her true self. Janet tells Kenneth that she “relaxes” around David, and that David was a particularly comforting person when Kenneth broke up with her. In this private conversation, the audience feels the stinging irony of the fact that Janet is discussing the love and affection she feels for David while unwittingly standing over a chest that holds his corpse.
It is through this conversation between Kenneth and Janet that we also see the seeds of suspicion about David’s whereabouts begin to sprout in the guests’ minds. Brandon’s belief in his own superiority, his belief that he can make suggestive, ironic statements and allude to the power of murder without getting caught begin to catch up with him. Kenneth remembers that Brandon alluded to him having a better shot with Janet when he first arrived, and Janet realizes what a liar Brandon is, pretending not to know certain details about her personal life. This puts pressure on Brandon’s showy schemes and desire to put one over on his guests. Additionally, Mr. Cadell becomes more and more suspicious of the games, partly because of Brandon's vigorous agreement with his claims about the "perfect murder," partly because of Mrs. Wilson's confiding in him about Brandon and Phillip's unusual behavior, and most tellingly, because of what he senses in his conversation with an anxious and guilty Phillip.
