3 out of 5

Director: Alfred Hitchcock

A very straight-forward mystery movie thats given full room to breath by Hitchcock. Family Plot is a film of two intersecting plots: 1 of a duo of jewel-thieves and kidnappers, and 2 of a sort-of-fake psychic (played by Barbara Harris) and her actor/boyfriend Bruce Dern, who agree to hunt down a long-lost son for a client in hopes of procuring a nice reward. Investigations into this long-lost kid and how it ends up tying to the jewel thieves are what takes up most of the 2 hour runtime, set out leisurely, which is all thanks, probably, to Hitchcocks comfort in laying out his film as such, as less-respected directors probably would have been pressured to chop this down. And whats interesting is that its not played out exactly for wows or thrills, so much as the story-tellers ability to put piece a and b together and have us all sit back and watch what happens. Which we do. There are a couple of great shots and moments in this, but in the middle it does seem to wander in certain scenes, less dedicated than at other moments. Regardless, its all acted charmingly, and remains an example of how to tell a good story without the need for some kind of marketable centerpiece.