As many critics observed at the time, Frantic constantly reads as a tribute to Hitchcock. Like Jimmy Stewart in The Man Who Knew Too Much, Ford is a bumbling American doctor abroad, trying to recover a mistakenly kidnapped family member. Like Cary Grant in North By Northwest he is forced by the plot to wear the same single-breasted suit throughout the entire movie, subjecting it to many desperate physical struggles and proving its indestructibility.
Yet in spite of the good reviews and a Grace Jones soundtrack, the original release lost money. I recently watched the movie again on DVD, and found it as good as I remembered.
