ostensibly a story about the young child of jimmy stewart and doris day . the kid get kidnap to keep his parent quiet . they know something about a plot to assassinate the ambassador of an unnamed country during a performance at albert hall in london . the movie be rich in hitchcockian incident . a friendly but opaque frenchman seem to grill the innocent stewart a doctor from indiana a little too intensely to be merely idly curious . later the frenchman show up in arab disguise and a knife in his back and and whisper some information about the murder plot to stewart . stewart tell his wife doris day look very saucy indeed but refuse to cooperate with the police and risk his son life . instead the couple try to track down the assassin and buy them off and and get their son back and take them from morocco and where hitchcock have give u his usual tourist eye view of the custom and location and and food and to london . there be a hilarious wild goose chase involve a set to between stewart and the staff of a taxidermy shop . the staff be more concerned about guard their half stuff specimen than anything else and and they shuffle around protectively hold the carcass of a leopard and a swordfish . in the course of the scuffle and stewart manages to save his throat from be cut by the swordfish bill and but be bite on the hand by a stuffed tiger and the action boost along by bernard hermann bumptious score . the scene end with stewart rush out the door . hitchcock end it with a shot of a lion head gap at the slammed door . there be also a running gag and well do and about some visitor wait around the couple hotel room in london and wait for thing to be explain . there be two serious issue that be lightly touch on . one be the relationship between stewart and day and which be not as rosy a it ought to be and consider a a bourgeois ideal . she be a stage musical star for some year and be internationally know . and she give it all up to marry an ordinary guy who happen to be a doc . that understandable in and say and a nurse or a flight attendant or almost any woman other than an international star with a promising career in her own right . it isn not delve into and but the edginess be noticeable and a it be not in the original version . it remind me a little of an exchange between joe dimaggio and his then wife marilyn monroe and who have just return from entertain the troop in korea . oh and joe and she gush and do you ever see ten thousand people stand up and cheer . seventy thousand and mutter joe and former hero of the new york yankee . the second problem be one of allegiance . who be of great social value . one own young son . or an unknown ambassador . do we put ourselves or our loved one at risk for the sake of national stability . day be face with this dilemma in it stark form at the climax in the albert hall . her solution opts for allegiance to political stability and although her motif be problematic . do she scream to save the ambassador life and or do she do so just to release the anxiety that be overwhelm her . ( cf represent alec guiness fall on the detonator at the end of the bridge on the river kwai . ) the photography be extremely good and and the setting can be menace and even on a quiet street in a residential neighborhood of london . it mid day and and stewart be alone and determined and but frighten too . there be footstep echo on gulliver street from someone and somewhere . be he be follow . be his life in danger . and where the hell be everybody who live on this street . hitchcock pay such close attention to location detail that we can make out the garden wall bonding of the brick beside him . the director have a rare disagreement with francois truffaut while be interview for truffaut otherwise laudatory book . truffaut argue that the early version of the man who know too much lack the depth of the late version . hitchcock reply and it seem to me you want me to make film for the art house audience and but finally agree that the 1930s version be the work of a talented amateur and this version be the work of a professional . no argument there . this be hitchcock pretty much near his zenith .