It is significant that this programme originally belonged to Sir Michael Balcon, one of the most important figures in British Cinema who was responsible for launching Alfred Hitchcock's career. (See lot 65).
Although Hitchcock directed two films before The Lodger - The Pleasure Garden (1925) and Always Tell Your Wife (1925) - he considered The Lodger to be ...his first true film... In many ways it was a breakthrough which also came to represent a blueprint for his future films. In the words of Ephraim Katz, this particular suspense drama ...told much of its story in visual terms. It contained some bold special effects and introduced a theme that was to reappear in many of the director's films, that of a man accused of a crime he did not commit, an ordinary man caught in a web of extraordinary events. It was also the first film in which Hitchcock made a personal appearance... an occurrence which later became a Hitchcock trademark.