The Night of the Hunter

1955’s The Night of the Hunter was the first and sadly last film to be directed by famed theatre and screen actor Charles Laughton. Though panned by audiences and critics on its theatrical release, the film has grown in statue over the years and is now widely regarded as a great work. Featuring expressionistic touches and unsettling themes, the film stands apart from the safer, noir tinted thrillers of its day. The plot features a villain so wicked that he scared me, an adult used to modern horror, nearly sixty years after he first appeared.

Robert Mitchum plays Reverend Harry Powell; a preacher turned serial killer who learns of a hidden fortune. While in prison on a minor charge, Powell shares a cell with Ben Harper (Peter Graves), a man serving a long sentence for robbery and murder. Before his arrest, Harper was able to hide his loot of $10,000, telling his children but no one else where the money was. Powell is able to track down the fatherless family and attempts to get the secret from the children while hiding his intent behind his squeaky clean, ministerial front.

Airplane

The second spoof film from frequent collaborators Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker is probably their most famous and most successful. Parodying the disaster movies of the previous twenty years and using 1957s Zero Hour! as its basis, Airplane! is frequently mentioned amongst the top comedies of all time. When both pilots become ill on a flight from Los Angeles to Chicago there is only one man (Robert Hays) aboard who can land the plane. He though is an ex-Military Pilot who has never recovered from his wartime experiences and is only on board to try and save his relationship with his Stewardess girlfriend (Julie Hagerty).  

I saw Airplane! a long time ago and had remembered bits and pieces but I enjoyed it a lot more on this viewing. The film is packed full of jokes but having watched it alone I subsequently wish I’d watched it with others.