Trivia
The fictitious country where most of the story takes place is named in the movie: in her first scene, Miss Froy says, "Bandrika is one of Europe's few undiscovered corners." The first two stations in the movie are identified by briefly visible signs, and the third in dialog: they are Zolnay, Dravka, and Morsken.
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Gilbert says he once drove "a miniature engine on the Dymchurch line". The Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway is a real-life miniature (1/3 normal size) railway in southeast England, which in 2003 still uses steam locomotives and carries passengers over 13 miles of route.
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Charters and Caldicott (played by Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne) proved to be such popular characters that they were teamed up in other films. They reappeared in Night Train to Munich (also starring Margaret Lockwood) and Millions Like Us, two films also written by Sidney Gilliat and Frank Launder. They also starred in the BBC Radio serials "Crook's Tour" (which was also made into a film), and "Secret Mission 609." In 1985, they reappeared in the BBC Television mystery mini-series, Charters & Caldicott, played by Robin Bailey and Michael Aldridge.
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The set that the movie was shot on was only ninety feet long.
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The film debut of Catherine Lacey.
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Orson Welles reportedly saw this film eleven times.
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Although he uses the fictitious Bandrikan language when speaking to his staff, at the end of the phone conversation in which he conveys Iris's room service order for "champagne", Boris, the harassed hotel manager, exclaims, "Oy vey is mir", a Yiddish expression meaning "woe is me."
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In the original cut, as seen in the 25th Anniversary national re-release of 1963, Charters and Caldicott have to share the same pair of pyjamas in the hotel after Charters has accidentally dropped his in the water jug. In later years and showings this innocent preamble has been snipped out and we cut straight to them in bed together. Though we can still see Charters' pyjamas hanging up to dry during the scene the explanation has disappeared.
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François Truffaut claimed this movie was his favorite Hitchcock and the best representation of Alfred Hitchcock's work.
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The brief shot of a ferry bringing Iris and Gilbert back to England (presumably across the English Channel) also appears as an Irish Sea ferry in Will Hay's Oh, Mr. Porter!.
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The cricket match that is being talked about in the movie by Charters (Basil Radford) is the description of the actual third Ashes test between England and Australia at Manchester in 1938. The result of the test match quite rightly was shown in the end through a newspaper headline - "Match abandoned due to rain".
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Film debut of Michael Redgrave.
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Vivien Leigh tested for the role that eventually went to Margaret Lockwood.
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In Hitchcock/Peter Bogdanovich Interview, Alfred Hitchcock revealed that Lady Vanishes was inspired by that legend of an Englishwoman who went with her daughter to the Palace Hotel in Paris in the 1880's, at the time of the Great Exposition. The woman was taken sick and they sent the girl across Paris to get some medicine, in a horse-vehicle, so it took about four hours, and when she came back she asked, "How's my mother?" "What mother?" "My mother. She's here, she's in her room. Room 22." They go up there. Different room, different wallpaper, everything. And the payoff of the whole story is, so the legend goes, that the woman had Bubonic plague and they dare not let anybody know she died, otherwise all of Paris would have emptied. That was the original situation and pictures like Lady Vanishes were all variations on it.
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The failure of the original copyright holder to renew the film's copyright resulted in it falling into public domain, meaning that virtually anyone could duplicate and sell a VHS/DVD copy of the film. Therefore, many of the versions of this film available on the market are either severely (and usually badly) edited and/or of extremely poor quality, having been duped from second- or third-generation (or more) copies of the film.
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The tune that Gilbert (Michael Redgrave) is humming is the Colonel Bogie March made famous in the 1957 blockbuster The Bridge on the River Kwai.
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While in the baggage car, Gilbert and Iris playfully acting along as Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Gilbert offers a Trichinopoly cigar to Iris as a sort of prize in an earlier observation. In Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Study in Scarlet" Sherlock Holmes deduces that a Trichinopoly cigar was smoked by the murderer.
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While in the baggage car, Gilbert and Iris playfully acting along as Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Gilbert offers in jest a Trichinopoly cigar to Iris as a sort of prize on mentioning an earlier observation. In reality, it's only a fountain pen. This is in reference to Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Study in Scarlet" in which Sherlock Holmes deduces that a Trichinopoly cigar was smoked by the murderer.
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Director Cameo
Alfred Hitchcock:
near the end of the movie at Victoria Station wearing a black coat and smoking a cigarette.
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Spoilers
The trivia items below may give away important plot points.
A musician is mysteriously strangled by disembodied hands after serenading Miss Froy under her hotel window. This is not one of the film's loose ends as previously reported. Froy uses a musical code and the singer can be assumed to be passing information to Froy. Note that Froy is carefully listening to the notes, not just enjoying the serenade. The singer is an informant or another spy.
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Aside from the beginning and the ending of the film, there was no background music used for the film. In order to get the realistic effect, Alfred Hitchcock insisted that there should be no background music except for the beginning of the film and the end of the film. Aside from the beginning and the end of the film, the only music the audience hear is the music sung by the musician outside the hotel, the music tune of Miss Froy, Colonel Bogey March music hummed by Gilbert (Michael Redgrave), the dance music conducted by Gilbert in his hotel room, and the dance music when Iris (Margaret Lockwood) meets Gilbert in the train.
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The Lady Vanishes (1938)
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