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The Night of the Hunter Overview:

The Night of the Hunter (1955) was a Film Noir - Drama Film directed by Charles Laughton, Robert Mitchum (uncredited) and Terry Sanders (uncredited) and produced by Paul Gregory.

The film was based on the novel of the same name written by Davis Grubb published in 1953.

SYNOPSIS

In this eerie meditation on good and evil, a murderous "preacher" with the elemental forces of "love" and "hate" tattooed on each hand relentlessly hunts two small children across the Depression-era Bible Belt to get at their dead father's stolen fortune. He marries then kills their mother (Winters), and the children flee on a nighttime river odyssey to the protection of Gish. In the only directorial effort by Laughton (from a screenplay by Agee), Mitchum turns in the performance of his career, with Gish as costar and camerawork by Cortez, of The Magnificent Ambersons (1942). A dreamlike parable laced with stunningly orchestrated symbolism. Despite current critical acclaim, it was a box-office flop and was nominated for no Academy Awards.

(Source: available at Amazon AMC Classic Movie Companion).

The Night of the Hunter was inducted into the National Film Registry in 1992.

The Night of the Hunter BlogHub Articles:

Robert Mitchum, Shelly Winters, and Lillian Gish star in "The Night of the Hunter"

By Stephen Reginald on May 30, 2023 From Classic Movie Man

Robert Mitchum, Shelly Winters, and Lillian Gish star in "The Night of the Hunter" The Night of the Hunter (1955) is an American thriller directed by Charles Laughton and starring Robert Mitchum, Shelly Winters, and Lillian Gish. The supporting cast includes James Gleason, Evelyn Varden, Billy ... Read full article

The Night of the Hunter (1955), Charles Laughton’s horrifying masterpiece

By Carol Martinheira on Oct 8, 2021 From The Old Hollywood Garden

The Night of the Hunter (1955), Charles Laughton’s horrifying masterpiece On October 8, 2021October 8, 2021 By CarolIn Uncategorized Can you believe it’s October already? I certainly can’t. But you know what that means. Horror Month is here! And we kick o... Read full article

Silver Screen Standards: The Night of the Hunter (1955)

By Jennifer Garlen on Sep 8, 2020 From Classic Movie Hub Blog

Silver Screen Standards: The Night of the Hunter (1955) The Night of the Hunter (1955) is such a haunting and unusual film that I often wonder what else Charles Laughton might have produced had he directed any more movies, but if he was only going to direct once at least we got this picture to sh... Read full article

ClassicFlix (Teen Scene): The Night of the Hunter (1955)

By Virginie Pronovost on Jun 29, 2017 From The Wonderful World of Cinema

From March 2015 to April 2017, I was writing the monthly Teen Scene column for the website ClassicFlix. My objective was to promote classic films among teenagers and young adults. Due to the establishing of a new version of the website, it’s now more difficult to access to the old version and read... Read full article

Love Fights Hate in "The Night of the Hunter"

By Rick29 on Sep 8, 2016 From Classic Film & TV Cafe

In addition to a gallery of memorable performances, actor Charles Laughton’s cinematic legacy includes one fling with directing—but oh what a fling it is! The Night of the Hunter is a haunting, poetic film that explores themes ranging from the battle between good and evil to the propensi... Read full article

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The Night of the Hunter Quotes:

Icey Spoon: A husband's one piece of store goods you never know 'til you get it home and take the paper off.
Rachel Cooper: Get your state troopers out here. I got something trapped in my barn.
Rachel Cooper: A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit. Neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits, ye shall know them.
Rachel Cooper: You know, when you're little, you have more endurance than God is ever to grant you again. Children are man at his strongest. They abide.
Birdie Steptoe: Man of my age needs a little snort in the morning, heat the boilers.
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The Night of the Hunter Facts
Robert Mitchum's autobiography contains many spurious accounts of the making of the film; one, for example, concerns director Charles Laughton, and how he supposedly found the script by James Agee totally unacceptable, rewriting it himself. This has been disproved by the discovery of Agee's 293-page first draft, back in 2004, which is, scene-for-scene, the film that Laughton directed.
Charles Laughton originally offered the role of Harry Powell to Gary Cooper, who turned it down as being possibly detrimental to his career.
In the Spanish version the translators changed the name of the girl from Pearl to May, perhaps for the difficult pronunciation in Spanish.
The sequence purportedly showing the preacher riding a horse in the distance was filmed in false perspective and was actually a midget astride a pony.
Robert Mitchum's autobiography contains many spurious accounts of the making of the film; in one of them, Charles Laughton is said to have had no great love for children, and so despised directing them in this film that Robert Mitchum found himself directing the children in several scenes. In reality, Laughton obsessed over ever facet of his first feature, including getting the performances of every actor (even the children) right; this would lead to him dismissing one actor, in particular, after all of his scenes had already been shot and starting again with another in the part.
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