[Woodk剧评社] "Hunter's Night" and the Great Depression that refused to go far

Ceasar 2021-12-08 08:01:39

Note: First on Woodk Forum.

"The Night of the Hunter" (1955), the only independent film directed by Charles Laughton, is a black classic that will not fade.

I just revisited "The Maltese Falcon" (1941) two days ago. I saw information that the status of "Horse" as the pioneering work of film noir has been questioned, and the voices of doubt say that its color is not the same. Later the standard film noir was so sharp. Today’s "Hunter's Night" gave me a glimpse of this legendary picture effect, and even the subtitles of the disc had to be made into white letters on a black background.

This aesthetic pursuit is deduced to the extreme close to silhouette, and the rich and delicate black reveals a world ruled by dark life.

"It's a hard world for little things." Mrs. Cooper, who took care of John and Pearl, thought of Powell wandering outside the window, muttering to herself.

During the Great Depression, Harry Powell, the "Blue Beard" dressed as a parade pastor, was imprisoned for the crime of stealing a car. He learned from the dreams of his inmate Harper, who was about to go to the gallows, that the 10,000 yuan that Harper robbed the bank was still hiding at home. So, with the money and the widow in front of you, how can "Blue Beard" not appear on the stage? Powell took advantage of the innocent and innocent Willa’s new widow’s wandering and depressing opportunity to deceive her into her trust and marry her as his wife; after confirming that it was Willa’s children, not her who knew where the money was hidden, he killed the useless Willa, his 25th wife, in order to further control and interrogate the child. Although the children are young, they swore in front of their father: not to tell anyone where the money is. The main theatrical tension of the film lies in Powell's threat to the two brothers and sisters pressing harder. He usually follows the two weak fugitives as the devil, and his tall and fierce silhouette in the night wanders from time to time, and sometimes stops on the background behind the little brother and sister.

The Great Depression once made the sweet and joyful Shirley Temple (Shirley Temple) a big hit: In difficult days, people have a little money to enter the theater. Most people will choose the latter, to relax for a while. The audience chooses to be blind collectively to the current situation of suffering. Their anxiety and fear can only be conveyed vaguely and distortedly from a film like "King Kong" (1933), which is similar to the human world but not in the human world. The orangutan monster overlooking New York from the highest point, who is it (he?)? How is it imagined?

Generations of filmmakers will never forget the Great Depression. In 1933, Chaplin had the courage to face it and set out to create "Modern Times" (1936), the film’s conviction and "Anger" Like The Grapes of Wrath (1939), although injustice and hardships go hand in hand, there is still hope. People are always intolerant to themselves.
Stars are shifting, and decades later, the Great Depression, like the Nazis, has become a dead and safe past, but it is still lingering and is always resurrected by borrowing the corpse. In the non-war years, thousands of people have been forced to death by daily life in a strange landscape: in that state, the humbleness, madness and evil of people and ordinary people can be expanded as much as they want in the writing of later generations. See "Hunter's Night", "Bonnie and Clyde" (Bonnie and Clyde, 1963), "Leaving the Plains on the Grass" (Ironweed, 1987), "Dogville" (Dogville, 2003), etc. "Bonnie and Clyde" is the rebellion of American youth in the 1960s, and "Dogtown" looks like a European criticism of the United States during the reintegration after the Cold War. What is "Hunter Night"? Maybe it's just a thriller with some religious preaching? I hope so, I don't know.

The scene of the film started from the death of Willa. She was sitting in a car under the water, her long hair and waterweed fluttering together. She was as beautiful as before against the sunlight reflected in the water. Then John and Pearl escaped from their homes, and the night scene on the starry night rafting river was photographed very charmingly. Powell killed Willa and threatened and chased the child. The big plot is so dangerous that people can't breathe, and this paragraph naturally turns into the darkness and tranquility of the night with the silent starry sky and river. The whole picture, there are only waves, the dim light on the horizon and the stars and the darkness. The little girl caressing the rag doll sits on the stern and gently sings the ancient ballads. The huge cobwebs and gilled toads along the way, The little bugs flying around the reeds, these dark creatures, watching them, a trace of ghosts and charms quietly emerged.

However, one of the most bizarre scenes in the whole film is also a few lines that unexpectedly appeared when the police arrested Powell outside Mrs. Cooper's house: The

police said to Powell that you were arrested for the murder of Willa Harper. The camera cut to John, and the boy suddenly knew that the missing mother had been killed by the murderer in front of him and stayed there. Seeing the policeman twisting Powell, he shouted "No! Don't! Don't!" He grabbed the rag doll with banknotes and rushed towards Powell who was lying on the ground. I thought he wanted to beat the murderer himself. , But he slapped the man with a rag doll, and said in his mouth: "Here! Here! Take it, Dad. Take it. I don’t want it, Dad! It’s too much! Here! Here! (Here! Here! Take it! back, Dad. Take it back! I don't want it, Dad! It's too much! Here! Here!)". Banknotes flew out of the doll and were scattered all over the ground.

All the women in the film, except Mrs. Cooper, are ignorant and simple, full of tendencies to be tempted by Satan, toward destruction and self-destruction. Both Willa and Pearl are confused by Powell. When Willa knows that her life is about to be deprived, she believes that the other party will marry her. Not for money. Before the father was taken away by the police, he only entrusted the money and the family's future to John, who was still a child. The confrontation in the first half of the film is also mainly between Powell and John. John is convinced that he is the prince who protects the king’s property from being stolen by the bad guys. He is stubborn, strong, and determined at a young age, and he does not harbor the charming Powell. After a little bit of fantasy, Powell didn't call him "Dad" when he was performing his warm stepfather. But the director hacked the audience severely in the end, and the mindset we established against John was crushed. And the pain of bereavement is like such a sudden and repeated use of silhouettes, which are extremely prominent: masculinity, contracts between men and money are less important than mothers. For children, mothers are irreplaceable. He is willing to exchange everything for his mother. That being the case, why did the director belittle the vast majority of women in the film? Unfortunately, Laughton did not direct the tube since then, and I couldn't find more clues for a while.

Critics in film history have repeatedly made mistakes that made future generations laugh. Laughton's short directorial career is also an example.

2007.2.13.

View more about The Night of the Hunter reviews

Extended Reading
  • Angelita 2022-04-22 07:01:26

    Four stars for technique, two stars for value. Crime shell, religious core. The bible is a mirror, and the troubled times are at work. Down by the current, the boat leaves the cobweb. Toads, tortoises, sheep and foxes, and snowy owls attack rabbits. Unaccompanied, star-studded everywhere. How to cope with ravening wolves in sheep's clothing? —— They abide and they endure. #OnAmericanOriginalSin# #misogym#

  • Gust 2022-03-27 09:01:06

    In front of me, I was still thinking that the priest took a knife and the auntie should come to show how handsome the shotgun should be. The auntie finally lived up to her expectations and played with the shotgun. The girl's acting skills and various scenes have been criticized by our teachers for "Its most strange film i'd ever seen". If I watched this film when I was a child, it would probably have become a childhood shadow like Sanmao Wanderers.

The Night of the Hunter quotes

  • Rev. Harry Powell: Salvation is a last-minute business, boy.

  • Rev. Harry Powell: She'll not be back. I reckon I'm safe in promising you that.