Heaven and Hell to Play With: The Filming of The Night of the Hunter

by Preston Neal Jones

Jones uncovers the fascinating inside story of the making of this film, one of the American Film Institutes's 100 Greatest Thrillers. Every aspect is revealed of the film's development and production – casting, design, shooting, scoring, and editing – to the profound disappointment upon its release. This book is the result of over a decade of archival research and interviews with a dozen key people associated with the film, including Grubb, Gregory, actors Robert Mitchum and Lillian Gish and cinematographer Stanley Cortez. Their oral histories, along with numerous artifacts and film stills, are here deftly assembled into an account that is as compelling as the movie it celebrates.

Genres: Film, Nonfiction

400 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2004

Reviews

[Yulia · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a wonderful book, a true gift for "Night of the Hunter" fans. An unusual structure befitting a most unusual film – almost a scene-by-scene coverage with incredible behind the scenes cast and crew interviews, sketches, pictures, etc. The only downside is that now I wish I had a book like that on all of my favourite films

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

At about page 150. Saw the movie, read the book, now reading the book about the movie. Re-Watched the move some weeks ago. I may have to re-re-watch it, and put Commentary on this time! (A tid-bit. Charles Laughton origianlly wantred Gary Cooper in the Mitchum role!!!)

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read as research for our Great Movies series at the library. We'll show and discuss The Night of the Hunter on Thursday, May 3 at 6:30pm at the Severna Park Library in Severna Park, Maryland.

[Jason Coffman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating, exhaustive book covering every aspect of the making of this amazing film. Starts with pre-production and then moves on to a scene-by-scene breakdown of the entire film and how it came about, through interviews with people involved in making the film and research done by the author-- including his watching the raw footage (9 hours!) of the film at the UCLA Archives. Absolutely worth reading if you're a fan of the film, or even if you're just curious about how such an odd thing ever got made in the first place.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book shows, in detail, how a masterpiece was created. The movie: The Night Of The Hunter. This book is unique in its up close and personal view of a perfect thing. It would only be on par with an oral history of the painting of Monet's Water Lilies, Dali's Lugubrious Game, Renoir's Bal du moulin de la Galette...this book will make a true artist feel "not alone".

[Ryan Splenda · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating history of the making of one of the greatest thrillers of all time. Jones does a wonderful job of explaining all the players involved...especially David Grubb (author of the original book), Charles Laughton (director), and Robert Mitchum (lead actor).

[Todd · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book, both fascinating and poignant.