Some key topics the class discussed about for Shadow of a Doubt Hitchcock’s use of Dutch angle when Charlies was in his room as he’s freaking out about being discovered. This was compared to the Dutch angle used in The 39 Steps and the scene with Mr. Memory.
Also discussed was how Uncle Charlie’s arrival in Santa Rosa lead to the emasculating of Joe. How he was reduced to sitting at the kid table while Uncle Joe got to read his paper along with Charlie humiliating him at his work.
The discussion also focused in on how this film shared similarities to noir films which were discovered after WWII by French film critics. Such noir elements is Young Charlie going out at night and being forced by her Uncle to go into a seedy bar where she took
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You get a sense of Uncle Charlie’s true nature when he steps off the train acting ill but as soon as he sees Young Charlie his starts walking normally. You know right then that he is a sort of con man. This leads to the scene when he forcefully grabs the newspaper he had taken from Young Charlies, hurting her wrist. When she is later questioned by the young detective about Uncle Charlie being dangerous, Young Charlie immediately clutches her wrist. Uncle Charlie forcefully grabbing things continues boiling to the scene at the bar where he is to Young Charlie’s horror violently wringing a table napkin.
The film also draws similarities to Uncle Charlie and Count Dracula (Marshal Deutelbaum 146). An evil coming from the East to the West. Dracula came from Transylvania while Uncle Charlie came from Pennsylvania. Instead of Dracula hiding in a coffin below deck on the ship Demeter, Uncle Charlie is hiding in a coffin like compartment on a train. Also the telepathic connection Uncle Charlie had with his niece is similar to that of Dracula and Mina