The Night of the Hunter (1955)

“Harry Powell (Robert Mitchum) marries and murders widows for their money, believing he is helping God do away with women who arouse men’s carnal instincts. Arrested for auto theft, he shares a cell with condemned killer Ben Harper (Peter Graves) and tries to get him to reveal the whereabouts of the $10,000 he stole. Only Ben’s nine-year-old son, John and four-year-old daughter, Pearl know the money is in Pearl’s doll and they have sworn to their father to keep this secret. After Ben is executed, Preacher goes to Cresap’s Landing to court Ben’s widow, Willa (Shelley Winters). He overwhelms her with his Scripture quoting, sermons and hymns, and she agrees to marry him. On their wedding night he tells her they will never have sex because it is sinful. When the depressed, confused, guilty woman catches him trying to force Pearl to reveal the whereabouts of the money, she is resigned to her fate but the children manage to escape downriver, with Preacher following close behind. “

• Director: Charles Laughtonmore
• Release Date: 24 November 1955 (Argentina)
• Run Time: 93 min
• Country: USA
• Genre: Drama , Film-Noir , Thriller

Tagline: The wedding night, the anticipation, the kiss, the knife, BUT ABOVE ALL… THE SUSPENSE!

Trivia: Reports that James Agee wrote an incoherent screenplay have been proved false by the 2004 discovery of his first draft. That document, although 293 pages in length and manifestly overwritten (as is common with first drafts), is scene for scene the film Charles Laughton directed. Likewise false are the reports that Agee was fired. Laughton, however much he gnashed his teeth at having such a behemoth of a text in his hands with only five weeks to go before the start of principal photography, calmly renewed Agee’s contract and directed him to cut it in half. He did. In Laughton’s stage work (GALILEO, CAIN MUTINY COURT MARTIAL, etc), the great actor demonstrated he was a script editor of genius — he could induce the most stubborn and prideful writer to cut, cut, cut. And so he did in Agee’s case. Later, apparently at Robert Mitchum’s request, Agee visited the set to settle a dispute between the star and Laughton. Letters & documents located in the archive of Agee’s agent Paul Kohner bear this out — they were brought to light by Laughton biographer Simon Callow, whose excellent BFI book about NIGHT OF THE HUNTER diligently sets this part of the record straight. The Agee first draft may eventually be published, but it has been read by scholars — most notably Prof. Jeffrey Couchman of Columbia University, who published his findings in an essay, “Credit Where Credit Is Due.” To assert Agee’s moral right to his screen credit in no way disputes Laughton’s greatness as a director — clearly, he was as expert with writers as he was with actors — but Agee has been belittled and even slandered over the years, when his contribution to NIGHT OF THE HUNTER was of primary and enduring importance. (Submitted by F.X. FEENEY, film critic and author, who has read the original Agee script.)

Goofs: Factual errors: After Harry Powell disappears from in front of Ms. Cooper’s yard, a barn owl swoops down on a rabbit. We can hear the owl’s wings flap even though barn owls make no noise when they fly.