Family Plot

Family Plot (1976) — watch online on iFILM, Alfred Hitchcock's final film and a wry farewell to the suspense genre he owned for five decades. Blanche, a small-time fake psychic, and her cab-driving boyfriend George take on a seemingly harmless job: track down the missing heir of a wealthy old woman. Neither of them suspects what's waiting at the end of that thread.

Working a parallel story are a polished pair of kidnappers — professionals who collect ransoms and leave no trace. Barbara Harris and Bruce Dern play the bumbling would-be detectives; Karen Black and William Devane are the criminals with the better wardrobe and sharper instincts. The two plots spiral toward each other with the kind of controlled mischief Hitchcock could pull off without raising his voice.

Adapted from Victor Canning's novel The Rainbird Pattern, the film was shot when Hitchcock was 76, forty-two years after his first feature. He never directed again. It's lighter than his 1950s masterworks, but the wit and the geometry of the plotting are all still there. Stream Family Plot (1976) in full on iFILM.