NIGHT OF THE HUNTER and the Southern Gothic

The only film that actor Charles Laughton directed is the now-celebrated NIGHT OF THE HUNTER (1955), a unique, nightmarish, dark fairy tale vision that's part of the "Southern Gothic" series of films currently running on the Criterion Channel.

The film's an adaptation of Davis Grubb's 1953 novel, which in turn was based on the real-life Depression-era case of Harry Powers, a serial killer who answered lonely-hearts ads and then murdered widows for their life savings, killing several of their children in the process. Powers was hanged in West Virginia in 1932. In THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER, the phony preacher "Reverend" Harry Powell (Robert Mitchum) targets Willa Harper (Shelley Winters), the widow of a bank robber who was hanged without ever divulging where he stashed the $10,000 he got away with. Once he's married to the doomed Willa, Harry Powell zeroes in on her children, John (Billy Chapin) and Pearl (Sally Jane Barnes), who clearly know where the money's hidden.

Soon the orphaned children have to flee downriver to escape the predatory killer on their trail. They're taken in by a self-sufficient farm-woman, Miss Rachel Cooper (Lillian Gish), who cares for needy children found wandering the roads during the Depression. Inevitably, there's an epic standoff between Miss Cooper and Harry Powell, with the fate of John and Pearl hanging in the balance.