 | The unlikely collaboration between actor Robert Mitchum and actor turned Director Charles Laughton produced a slice of cinematic magic. Mitchum was a troublemaker – part myth and part reality – Laughton was a perfectionist – could this dynamic work? The film has now quite correctly become a cult classic |
The unlikely collaboration between actor Robert Mitchum and actor turned Director Charles Laughton produced a slice of cinematic magic. Mitchum was a troublemaker – part myth and part reality – Laughton was a perfectionist – could this dynamic work?
The movie that Charles Laughton had been so enthusiastic about making, and had approached with such diligence and excitement, was a disappointing failure, both at the box office and according to most critics of the day. Well, Laughton only made one film as director due to this response to this movie – which in this writers opinion is a crying shame as this is a poetic and beautiful if fanciful film.
In the deep South at the height of the depression, the Preacher Harry Powell, a man who frequents strip bars, carries a flick knife and has the infamous words LOVE and HATE tattooed on his knuckles, is in jail for the un-preacher like crime of stealing a car.
The casting is magnificent with Mitchum as the dark-hearted preacher who hates abhorrence of hypocrites, especially the self-righteous and silent film star Lillian Gish wonderful as the matriarch, who argue over the escaped children of, widow Shelley Winters.
Despite the critics and audience indifference the film has now quite correctly become a cult classic – one, which examines the human condition alongside some of the most beautiful series of cinematic images since the glory days of FW Murnau’s Sunrise.
The movie that Charles Laughton had been so enthusiastic about making, and had approached with such diligence and excitement, was a disappointing failure, both at the box office and according to most critics of the day. Well, Laughton only made one film as director due to this response to this movie – which in this writers opinion is a crying shame as this is a poetic and beautiful if fanciful film.
In the deep South at the height of the depression, the Preacher Harry Powell, a man who frequents strip bars, carries a flick knife and has the infamous words LOVE and HATE tattooed on his knuckles, is in jail for the un-preacher like crime of stealing a car.
The casting is magnificent with Mitchum as the dark-hearted preacher who hates abhorrence of hypocrites, especially the self-righteous and silent film star Lillian Gish wonderful as the matriarch, who argue over the escaped children of, widow Shelley Winters.
Despite the critics and audience indifference the film has now quite correctly become a cult classic – one, which examines the human condition alongside some of the most beautiful series of cinematic images since the glory days of FW Murnau’s Sunrise.