The Movie Book (Big Ideas Simply Explained) (2016)

IN CONTEXT

GENRE

Thriller, horror

DIRECTOR

Charles Laughton

WRITERS

James Agee (screenplay); Davis Grubb (novel)

STARS

Robert Mitchum, Shelley Winters, Lillian Gish

BEFORE

1933 Charles Laughton wins an Oscar for the lead role in The Private Life of Henry VIII.

1947 Robert Mitchum makes his name in film noir with Build My Gallows High.

AFTER

1962 In Cape Fear, Mitchum again plays an ex-con who terrorizes a family, pitted against lawyer Gregory Peck.

Upon its release, The Night of the Hunter was such a critical and commercial failure that actor-turned-director Charles Laughton never directed another movie. The movie was marketed as, and appeared to be, a film noir, an idea reinforced by the casting of genre mainstay Robert Mitchum in the lead role. Yet it has more in common with 1920s German Expressionist horror movies than it does with hard-boiled noir, with its use of exaggerated framing shots and shadow to create an escalating mood of dread. Contemporary audiences were, perhaps, confused when their expectations were confounded, but over time the movie has established itself as a key work of American cinema, a modern-day fairy tale unafraid of reveling in its darkness, both literally and figuratively.

"Charles finally had very little respect for [screenwriter] Agee. And he hated the script, but he was inspired by his hatred."

Elsa Lanchester
Charles Laughton’s wife

Wolf in sheep’s clothing

This is the story of a psychopath in preacher’s clothing, Harry Powell (Mitchum), a con man who seduces and murders women. The action is set in the Great Depression, which has driven desperate family man Ben Harper to attempt a bank robbery. Harper is caught and sentenced to death for murdering two people during the robbery.

Powell shares a cell with Harper while Harper awaits execution. He learns that the condemned man has hidden $10,000 with his family. On his release, Powell sets out to ingratiate himself with Harper’s widow, Willa (Shelley Winters), and her two children. Willa is to be the next hapless victim of his creepy yet all too smooth preacher act.

Light and shadow

One of the most notable aspects of The Night of the Hunter is how powerfully it communicates significance in ways other than dialogue. For instance, encroaching threat is conveyed by the overtly styled framing of the children’s hiding place in a barn, juxtaposed with Powell on the distant horizon, or by the way shadows overwhelm a bedroom, leaving what little light remains to create the effect of an altar as Powell murders Willa. The image of a corrupted altar in a church mirrors Powell’s own status as a false prophet, an amoral man who uses the word of God to serve his own nefarious purposes.

The use of high-contrast black-and-white photography also helps to highlight the contrast between good and evil in the movie.

Menace and meaning are further conveyed through the use of song. Harry Powell appropriates a hymn “Leaning on the everlasting arms,” which he sings to himself as he hunts the children, Pearl and John. Its lyrics are about the peace and joy believers find in the arms of the Lord. In the small town that he infiltrates, Powell poses as a man of God whom the bereaved Willa can lean on as she copes with the loss of her husband, and whom the local community trusts with the care of the children after she subsequently disappears. He appears to be the picture of charity, and a trusted authority figure—but his true intentions are to abuse, exploit, and steal.

“She’ll not be back. I reckon I’m safe in promising you that.”

Harry Powell / The Night of the Hunter

Light and shade are used to frame key images. As Powell stands over Willa, knife in hand, her bedroom is converted by the shadows into a perverted church.

Magical realism

As John and Pearl escape Powell’s clutches in a rowboat that carries them away by river, their journey into a dangerous unknown is conveyed by song, rather than dialogue. Pearl sings of a fly soaring up to the moon. A tiny thing in a vast world, the fly does not know what perils lie before it, yet it goes anyway, for there is no other course. The song adds to the expressionistic feel of the movie, creating a sense of magical realism.

“Salvation is a last-minute business, boy.”

Harry Powell / The Night of the Hunter

Horror in the home

In the 1970s, movies such as Halloween and The Exorcist were praised for domesticating horror, bringing it out of the abandoned asylums and castles and into the home. Yet, 20 years earlier, The Night of the Hunter had already done this. Terror is built up during the movie as Powell ingratiates his way into John and Pearl’s family, seducing their mother with his religious fervor. One by one, he violates the domestic norms that are supposed to make the children feel safe in his care. Rather than nurturing and feeding them as expected, he starves them in his attempt to make them confess where the money is hidden. The sense of menace becomes almost unbearable as he leads them down to the cellar by candlelight. These scenes terrify audiences because they tap into an innate fear: the violation of the home, the place where people should feel safe.

The widow Willa is won over by the phoney charm of the false preacher, who brings horror into her home.

Fairy-tale ending

Eventually, the children are taken in by the kindly and wise Rachel Cooper (played by Hollywood veteran of the silent era Lillian Gish), an old woman who has adopted a number of children that have fallen victim to the Depression. Like a fairy godmother, Rachel protects Pearl and John—but Powell is not yet finished, and the children are not yet safe.

The Night of the Hunter is hard to categorize, which may explain why, on its release, it was met with incomprehension. It is experimental, with close stylistic ties to German Expressionism. Scene after scene hovers on the cusp between dream and nightmare, real and surreal. Above all, it is a terrifying but hopeful fairy tale—candid in its depiction of the evil Powell, but also insistent on the possibility that evil can be fought. It is a story of love and hate, the words tattooed on Powell’s knuckles. These two elemental forces collide in one of the most magical movies ever made.

Powell uses his tattoos to tell a moralizing tale of love and hate, but Rachel Cooper can see right through him.

Charles Laughton was born in 1899 in Scarborough, in the north of England. He trained at RADA, the London dramatic arts academy, which enabled him to get his first acting work on the London stage.

He made his Hollywood movie debut with the 1932 movie The Old Dark House, starring opposite Boris Karloff. His most iconic role came a year later, starring as the title character in The Private Life of Henry VIII, a performance that won him the Academy Award for best actor in 1933. Laughton went on to star in such movies as Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), Jamaica Inn (1939), and Spartacus (1960).

Laughton’s only foray into directing was with The Night of the Hunter. Although it has gained critical mass over the years, the movie’s initial box-office failure discouraged him, and he did not direct again. He died in California in 1962.

1955 The Night of the Hunter

What else to watch: M (1931) ✵ Build My Gallows High (1947) ✵ Angel Face (1952) ✵ Les Diaboliques (1955) ✵ Touch of Evil (1958) ✵ Cape Fear (1962)