The Night of the Hunter (1955) would prove to be the only picture Charles Laughton ever directed. It had a screenplay by James Agee, photography by Stanley Cortez, and brilliant performances by Mitchum, as evil incarnate, Shelley Winters, Lillian Gish, Billy Chapin, Peter Graves, and the ubiquitous Jimmy Gleason.
The film is a masterpiece, but it failed at the box office, which discouraged Laughton from ever directing again.
The villain-protagonist Harry Powell purports to be a man of God, but is actually the opposite: He worships himself, and is a serial murderer.
Unfortunately, in the real case this picture was based on, nobody was able to save the children, and the son was unable to escape, because Drenth/Powers had imprisoned the family in a sound-proof, cement basement-torture chamber. There was no real-life Rachel Cooper (Gish). “He would later confide to police that it gave him sexual excitement to hear his victims' screams from within the chamber at night” (Juan Ignacio Blanco).
Herman Drenth, aka Harry F. Powers (“Harry Powell” in the novel and picture).
Drenth/Powers’ real known victims: Aster Eicher, 50, and her children Greta, 14; Harry, 12; and Anabel, 9; and Dorothy Lemke, 50. He was believed to have murdered as many as 50 victims, mostly widows seeking to remarry, who had responded to his “lonely hearts” ads.
Since we still had a criminal justice system in those days, the only earthly justice possible was meted out to Drenth/Powers: Execution (by hanging) on March 18, 1932.
https://murderpedia.org/male.P/p/powers-harry.htm
Bob Mitchum cut a couple of successful albums. The man could sing.
2 comments:
Night of the Hunter is a great movie. I think you can find that it influenced directors like Terrance Malick and David Lynch.
The clip looks fantastic--quite a style and mood.I wonder if I'll ever watch it.
--GRA
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