The Night Of The Hunter (1955)

“A perennially unsettling masterpiece from which modern chillers could learn much.” – Observer (UK)

SYNOPSIS

A tall, handsome ‘preacher’ – his knuckles eerily tattooed with ‘love’ and ‘hate’ – roams the countryside, spreading the gospel… and leaving a trail of murdered women in his wake. To Reverend Harry Powell (Robert Mitchum), the work of the Lord has more to do with condemning souls than saving them, especially when his own interests are involved. Now his sights are set on $10,000 – and two little children are the only ones who know where it is. ‘Chill…dren!’ the preacher croons to the terrified boy and girl hiding in the cold, dark cellar… innocent young lambs who refuse to be led astray.

PROGRAM NOTE

Seventy years have done nothing to dull the strange radiance of Charles Laughton’s one-and-only film as a director. A Southern Gothic fable rendered in expressionist shadows, a noir disguised as a bedtime story, a horror film glimpsed through a child’s trembling sense of the world – The Night of the Hunter remains a spell American cinema has never quite shaken off. Once seen, it is never forgotten. 

Robert Mitchum gives one of his greatest performances as the serial-killing Reverend Harry Powell, equal parts Bluebeard and, per Pauline Kael, a “Pied Piper in reverse,” a roving preacher who insinuates himself into a God-fearing Ohio River town all too ready to mistake his oily charisma for divine providence. Like many in town, the widowed Willa Harper (Shelley Winters) fails to see him for what he is, but her children, John and Pearl, see all too clearly, and soon find themselves at risk of becoming Powell’s next victims. 

Operating at a dramatic intersection of religion and greed that’s as American as apple pie, Laughton and cinematographer Stanley Cortez (The Magnificent Ambersons) visualize this anti-pastoral fairy tale in stark, graphic images, infusing the frame with chapel-like architecture and high-contrast luminosity that mirrors the film’s central struggle between darkness and light. Praised by film critic Dave Kehr as “a film without precedent and without any real equals,” we’re proud to present a sterling 4K restoration of a classic that the legendary Roger Ebert simply declared “one of the greatest of all American films.” 

Repertory Film Programming and Membership Manager Dan Santelli will conduct a pre-show seminar in the Garden Suite, unpacking the history of the film’s production, its unique visual style, and the legacy it has left on film culture. This screening is sponsored by Dring Wetherill.