Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)

An old southern mansion is slated to be demolished but the loony shut-in (Bette Davis) who lives there isn’t playing nice. Her trusty doctor (Joseph Cotten) and her cousin (Olivia de Havilland) offer their guidance while Charlotte goes completely off the rails.

Back story: young Charlotte’s domineering dad disapproves of her running off with a married man (Bruce Dern). When the breakup he engineered goes bad (read: the head was never found), Charlotte is presumed to be the killer. So hide in the spooky mansion she does.

Hush Hush has a few things in common with What Ever Happened to Baby Jane made two years earlier, besides the hag-like Bette Davis in a spooky house. First, they both were directed by Robert Aldrich, who is totally not Robert Altman. Not even a little. Secondly, the Cousin Miriam character was initially played by Joan Crawford. In fact her arrival scene is still included in the final print, before she is visible. Crawford and Davis’ notorious animosity made that pairing unworkable and Aldrich made a trek to the Swiss mountains to convince de Havilland to replace her.

Endora herself Agnes Moorehead was wonderful as a nutty housekeeper. Very different role than what I’ve seen her in before. Victim of 2016 George Kennedy had a small role. Mary Astor appears in her final role. Big Daddy was played by King Tut himself Victor Buono, who also appeared in Baby Jane.

Because style and setting were so similar to Baby Jane, had Crawford stayed in the film it almost would read like a sequel. And part of me would want to see that film. As it stands, it has an excellent story, excellent acting (save Cotten’s terrible accent), and an all around first class production. But I give it a half tick lower. Maybe if I had seen it first … AMRU 4

The Night of the Hunter (1955)

While in the county lockup a dubious preacher (Robert Mitchum) with a troubled past learns that a man slated to be executed (Peter Graves) hid ten thousand stolen dollars. Once freed, he decides to pay the grieving widow a visit. The son is wise.

The Shelley Winters I remember was a fat, obnoxious, busybody who gossipped endlessly on talk shows about better actors she had worked with. I remember her badmouthing Marilyn Monroe and found that distasteful. Maybe I was too harsh. I later learned what a train-wreck Monroe really was. And Winters’ personal story was one of a hard working actress being type-casted out of more challenging and coveted roles. Until roles like the one here came along. I will, as I have done before, put aside what I know. While her character wasn’t terribly deep or complicated, her performance was. And nothing like what I expected her to be.

Mitchum’s Harry Powell was seldom unhinged but frequently on the cusp. He is single minded, almost Terminator like, in finding the money and capturing the kids. I haven’t seen too much of his work but he’s usually the protagonist. He lobbied hard for this role that director Charles Laughton wanted for himself. That would have been a disaster!

Silent film giant Lillian Gish was delightful as a stern but kindly woman who took in troubled street children. She sets the tone with an opening monologue despite not showing up in the story until the third act. I haven’t seen her silent work yet but she was in the snoozer Follow Me, Boys. Billy Chapin was absolutely fantastic as the suspicious boy and parlayed this success into a life of substance abuse. He wouldn’t appear on screen after the 1950’s.

The Night of the Hunter is a beautifully shot, wonderfully acted, perfectly paced film. Shot like a silent film, it defies categorization. Is it Horror? Maybe. Film-Noir? I suppose. Genius? Absolutely. But apparently it was a critical and commercial failure and Laughton would never direct again. This is a real shame because Hollywood seemed to have lost its way during the 1950s. So many of the big films were shallow, two dimensional vanity projects. Much like today. Hunter, however, was inspired, innovative, and refreshing. And it kept you on the edge of your seat. AMRU 4.5.

“Don’t he ever sleep?”

Murder on the Orient Express (1974)

World Famous Detective Hercule Poirot (Albert Finney) takes The Orient Express back to London when a man is murdered in the night. He is urged to solve the mystery while the train is stuck in snow so that the Czech authorities don’t become involved. Hercule soon learns that many of the passengers in the train car had a connection to the deceased and maybe reason to do him harm.

Murder on the Orient Express has an amazing ensemble cast. Sean Connery was the biggest name at the time so they signed him up first. Everyone else followed along. Ingrid Bergman is almost unrecognizable as a nutty nanny. Anthony Perkins and Martin Balsam are together again for the third time, having done Psycho and Catch-22 together. No toilets were involved with this pairing. The older, unsexy Lauren Bacall makes her first appearance here. First appearance of Michael Redgrave’s daughter. Oddly, I am more familiar with her sister. Apparently I used to watch House Calls. One of these days I'll watch Blow Up.

I saw Murder on the Orient Express as a kid and remembered key elements. Like who done it. Still, this is a very well made, very entertaining film that was faithful enough to the source material to get the approval of Agatha’s herself. And it holds up to a second viewing, at least when thirty years separates the two. AMRU 4.

"Bianchi, Doctor, has it occurred to you that there are too many clues in this room?"