Notorious is a 1946 American thriller film directed and produced by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman and Claude Rains as three people whose lives become intimately entangled during an espionage operation. It was shot in late 1945 and early 1946, and was released by RKO Radio Pictures in August 1946. Notorious marks a watershed for Hitchcock artistically, and represents a heightened thematic maturity. His biographer, Donald Spoto, writes that Notorious is in fact Alfred Hitchcock's first attempt—at the age of forty-six—to bring his talents to the creation of a serious love story, and its story of two men in love with Ingrid Bergman could only have been made at this stage of his life. The film is known for two scenes in particular. In one of his most famous shots,Hitchcock starts wide and high on a second floor balcony overlooking the great hall of a grand mansion. Slowly he tracks down and in on Ingrid Bergman, finally ending with a tight close-up of a key tucked in her hand. Hitchcock also devised a celebrated scenethat circumvented the Production Code's ban on kisses longer than three seconds—by having his actors disengage every three seconds, murmur and nuzzle each other, then start right back up again. The two-and-a-half-minute kiss is perhaps his most intimate and erotic kiss. In 2006, Notorious was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant. Directed by Alfred Hitchcock Produced by Alfred Hitchcock (uncredited) Written by Ben Hecht Starring Cary Grant Ingrid Bergman Claude Rains Music by Roy Webb Cinematography Ted Tetzlaff Edited by Theron Warth Production company RKO Radio Pictures Distributed by RKO Radio Pictures Release dates August 15, 1946 ( Premiere-New York City ) September 6, 1946 (U.S.) Running time 101 minutes Country United States Budget $2 million Box office $24.5 million