FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT: Timing and Hats

One more thought on the cameo, which highlights the motif of timing in Foreign Correspondent: Johnny Jones has just left the hotel, not sure how he would catch up to Van Meer. It is when he walks by Alfred Hitchcock that he hears someone call out Van Meer's name; he turns around, sees Van Meer hailing a taxi, and we cut to his reaction, in which we glimpse a second view of H. Johnny turns and chases after Van Meer and gets an "exclusive" interview in the cab, which of course, reveals nothing. Again, though, timing was crucial: if Jones left the hotel a momewnt later or earlier, he would have missed that fateful connection with Van Meer.

Timing is important on another level. Not only were foreign correspondents courageous and so forth, but they were lucky enough to be in Europe, covering the greatest war in history, using the latest technology to publicize it and make a name for themselves along the way. Rather fortuitous timing, indeed!

One other detail. There is a typographical error in the closing credits: ffolliett's named is capitalized, which is incorrect. How could that have been missed, as the film makes great pains to explain the lower case spelling and we are given insert shots of the name, hand written, lower case.

Joel Gunz

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