The Great Movies: "Night of the Hunter"

Night of the Hunter

Charles Laughton, 1955.

A modern thriller is often judged on its twists and turns, on how much the filmmakers can surprise us with plot reversals and shocking revelations that make us rethink everything that has gone before. So an earlier thriller like Night of the Hunter can feel pretty plodding these days just for being straightforward. This is a movie about a creepy preacher who preys on rich widows, and no time is wasted in establishing the premise. In a modern version, we wouldn't begin to suspect anything was amiss with the humble man of God until the 45-minute mark. In Night of the Hunter, the preacher shows his cards in his opening soliloquy.

The strength of this film is its imagery. The black and white photography is terrific, and the sets are slightly surreal, placing the characters in spaces that are at once familiar and grotesque. It is becoming obvious, halfway through this project, that Roger Ebert really loves him a motion picture image; so many of these Great Movies have great visuals but fairly serious flaws elsewhere.

In Night of the Hunter, all of that great photography is undercut by characters whose actions, depending on how charitable you are feeling, are either "highly mannered" or represent that their collective IQ approaches that of a turnip. The Spooky Preacher's work is just all too easy in this little village; the potentially rich widow is all but forced on him within five minutes of his arrival in town, before he's done telling his blatantly dodgy back story. A quick phone call would clear things up, but it doesn't occur to anyone that anything needs clearing up. Mysterious preacher passing through.... new widow.... why wouldn't there be a wedding?

These things I'm identifying as problems can be defended, as with my review of Metropolis last week, as intentional aspects of an Expressionist approach to filmmaking. My personal (and admittedly unorthodox (and arguably kind of crabby)) response to that would be that just because it's intentional, and just because it has a basis in theory, doesn't mean it ain't a flaw.


The Plot: Only the children know where the $10,000 is hid. The Spooky Preacher marries mom, interrogates the kids relentlessly, and eventually pursues them on a slow-speed chase down the Ohio River, the townspeople placidly failing to register anything unusual or disturbing throughout.

Visuals: Great!

Dialogue: Pretty thin. Most noted for the Spooky Preacher acting out the battle between L-O-V-E, tattooed on his right hand, and H-A-T-E, tattooed on his left hand. This little parable turns out to be a microcosm of the whole movie's narrative arc, which is kind of cool I guess.

Prognosis: It wouldn't be the worst movie you've ever seen, but you could probably find better ways to spend 90 minutes, too.


NEXT WEEK: John Ford's My Darling Clementine