TS Out Of The Past vs. Night Of The Hunter

Simon Callow book on NOTH is pretty good.

I have been really wanting to see NOTH for a week now. I have a sneaking feeling it might be one of the best films I've never seen.

Both great, but OOTP is the best kind of studio film, while NOTH is something else -- something weirder and stranger.

Simon Callow book on NOTH is pretty good.

Man, I want to read that.

i always tell people NotH is one of my favourite films but i watched it again a few weeks ago and, well, i didn't like it. at all. i fell out of love with it and i'm not sure why.

Haha, Anthony, as I was reading about the way they tried to adapt the novel to the film and were basically faithful but made certain changes to tell the story more efficiently-more cinematically- and was reading about how the director collaborated with the original novelist and his screenwriter, so much so that the screenwriter wanted his credit reduced, at one point I thought: "Man, Miccio should read this, so he will stop going about those meaningless terms 'filmic' and 'auteur'."

Also the part where they screened lots of silent movies to plan how they were going to shoot it.

Agee is a great critic -- really discovered him through library copies of the recent Modern Library collections of his reviews after years of hearing secondhand of his greatness -- so I'm curious to know what an Agee script might look like.

There's a book of them, no?

Haha, Anthony, as I was reading about the way they tried to adapt the novel to the film and were basically faithful but made certain changes to tell the story more efficiently-more cinematically- and was reading about how the director collaborated with the original novelist and his screenwriter, so much so that the screenwriter wanted his credit reduced, at one point I thought: "Man, Miccio should read this, so he will stop going about those meaningless terms 'filmic' and 'auteur'."

sorry, anecdotes about a director changing a story to make it more efficient and more dependent on visual, to the point that the writer wants their credit reduce doesn't show the necessity of words like "filmic" and "auteur."

the idea that movies SHOULD be efficient and more dependent on visual is a stance I share, but they don't make a movie more movie-like. all movies are movie-like.

Out of the Past!

I love both but I remember more from Night Of The Hunter and like him in Cape Fear even more, so I gotta go with psycho Robert.

> all movies are movie-like.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0196530/

"Der Schnee ist weiß“ ist wahr, wenn und nur wenn der Schnee weiß ist.

got that tattooed across the back of my shoulders

"Schnee" auf einer Schulter, "Weiß" auf der andere.

Yeah, I'm a nitpicky jerk, what else is new?

i wouldn't say you were a nitpicky jerk. though that movie is just a long-ass boring one, I assume.

I actually take back that movies SHOULD be efficient and heavily dependent on visuals. They're simply qualities I tend to appreciate, not necessary criteria for cinematic status or something. All movies end eventually and have something on the screen.

back to the subject, there's a LOT of Mitchum I haven't seen. Any faves out there besides the three mentioned in the opening posts?

Check out the pretty good thread over at Robert Mitchum C/D, S/D, which you yourself have posted on.

Also should note this very good standalone thread: "night of the hunter"

Check out the pretty good thread over at Robert Mitchum C/D, S/D, which you yourself have posted on.

four years ago!

Heh - it was just the least movie-like movie I could come up with on a moment's notice. I suppose there might be some 'film' that's an unvarying shot of a still photo with no soundtrack that would be even less movie-ish, but yeah, it's still light flashing at 24 fps so it's not quite the same as actually looking at the still photo, etc. I was just (and here's the nitpicky part) pointing out that it's possible to make a movie that's entirely dependent on visuals, yet is about as 'unmovielike' as it can be, under our usual understanding of what movies are like.

Even tho OOTP has Jane Greer in it, I would have to go for NOTH. Still, Jane Greer though...

Dadaismus, are you Howard Hughes?

Night Of The Hunter is great and all, but it does feel like a "first movie" to me, like Laughton tried to cram a bit too much stuff into one film. Add to that the fact that of course he never directed another movie and it ends up being more of a frustrating experience than anything else, so full of "what if?". Out Of The Past, meanwhile, is just perfect as it is, immaculately paced, everyone at the top of their game. Alfred is right when he calls it "the best kind of studio film", but I guess to me those are the best kinds of movies, period.

Anthony, I don't have much to add to the thread posted as far as Mitchum recs go, but definitley read Baby, I Don't Care by Lee Server - you don't even have to be that much into Mitchum, dude could make anything seem fascinating! But of course Bob is anyway, so it's all good.

The great thing about that bio is that he makes the real life anecdotes sound like scenes from Mitchum movies. Such as the story of Mitchum and his brother riding the rails cross-country and the brother being caught by a railroad bull. (Mitchum himself had been caught earlier and was put on a chain gang from which he escaped!) When the brother finally arrived at the sister's house in California, he walked dirty and disheveled into the bathroom, where Bob, lounging in a bubble bath, smoking a cigar and reading Hollywood Confidential and some other screen magazines, greeted him with the words "What kept you?"

The un(der)credited screenwriter on NOTH Frank Fenton seems to be a topic for further research.

No, I meant OOTP

Out of the Past is maybe my fave American movie of that immediate postwar period. Lillian Gish has always annoyed me in TNotH.

jeez, croupier pointing his "all movies are movie-like" hard-on everywhere.

The child actors in Hunter aren't particularly outstanding, are they?

Never thought so.

The child actors in Hunter aren't particularly outstanding, are they?

Ha ha! My dad had a bit part in this flick.

They should have bumped him up to the main role.

The child actors in Hunter aren't particularly outstanding, are they?

I prefer their amateurism (especially in the film's hyper-fussy context) to creepy, polished Dakota Fanning school of kid performances. Of course, I prefer root canal to that also.

Yeah, if the kids were Shirley Temple types, the Preacher's plot would have been uncovered within five minutes.

Unless there is a typo, they got Stanley Cortez to DP when they did a TV remake in 1991.

Rewatched OOTP for the first time in awhile. Forgot all about Jose Rodriguez.

Is the black-coated enforcer, Paul Valentine, real good in anything else? This was his debut.

Besides Kirk Douglas, Rhonda Fleming and Dickie Moore are still living.

Mitchum and Jane Greer did a parody on SNL in '87, Out of Gas! You can see it if you have HuluPlus.

Jose Rodriguez = rowr

Weird, I was just looking at the thread ten minute ago while searching through the Noir threads and was afraid I had accidentally revived it.

Speaking of Rhonda Fleming, I went back to the 8:00 at MoMa to see Tennessee's Partner and intending to see Slightly Scarlet today or tomorrow.

might get to SS tonight

Want to see the other two today, Silver Lode and Sands of Iwo Jima, so may go to SS tomorrow.

Is there a way to win?
Well, there's a way to lose more slowly.

Dadaismus, are you Howard Hughes?

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Saturday, 17 November 2007 14:38 (6 years ago) Permalink

wrt Jane Greer, we're all Howard hughes.

Love both films but its OOTH. Not necessarily just bcz of Greer, more the script..

ha

RIP Dickie Moore

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/bd/68/52/bd6852b1ab3fc42055a52819e17e037e.jpg

i.e. Hillary Swank

tsk tsk

he really looked like himself from age 4 to 80

Rewatched OOTP for the first time in awhile. Forgot all about Jose Rodriguez.

Is the black-coated enforcer, Paul Valentine, real good in anything else? This was his debut.

Besides Kirk Douglas, Rhonda Fleming and Dickie Moore are still living.

Mitchum and Jane Greer did a parody on SNL in '87, /Out of Gas/! You can see it if you have HuluPlus.

I get the idea Jose Rodriguez is flirting with Mitchum and Douglas and waiting to see who takes the bait

https://ascmag.com/articles/flashback-the-night-of-the-hunter