The Wrong Man (1956)

There are few things as painful to watch a perfect gentleman get rolled up into a police procedural due to wrongful accusation. This film is slow, deliberate, and deeply troubling. Almost impossible to watch. The utter unraveling of a life and a sense of overwhelming despair that destroys lives. What is so disturbing is that this is by all means routine bureaucratic work. No one is really at fault. And yet, that is little relief for those caught in this Kafkaesque quagmire. Some of it is only believable because it is a true story.

The Wrong Man is a glorious work, one of Hitchcock’s best.