Wait Until Dark (1967)

Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

good back-story, and good acting

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

It has been many years since I saw this film, probably in 1968. I remember it was a very suspenseful and tense movie which I thoroughly absorbed. If I could have rated it in those years I would probably have given it 8 out of 10.I watched this movie again today and what I enjoyed most was seeing very well known actors in their twilight years today, as young adults in this movie. I had not recalled that known actors starred in this film, other than Audrey Hepburn with her outstanding portrayal as the blind woman, who passed away a number of years ago. Because I did remember part of the plot, I found the beginning a bit drawn out this time around. The story today would also be totally absurd, cumbersome and aged. Nevertheless it is still an enjoyable and good movie for which I give it a rating of 7 in this day and age.

Just because there were no blood and explicit sexual scenes doesn't mean that the oldies couldn't have produced a suspenseful and meaningful thriller about a blind girl caught up in a scheme by two scoundrels trying to take the advantage of her handicap. We usually haven't seen Audrey Hepburn in this kind of roles, but she managed to portray an innocent, yet capable blind girl pretty persuasive, as did once young Alan Arkin as her nemesis. As for the script, there will be some really great scenes towards the end and the overall sense of adequate approach to the plot will be present. "Wait until dark" is one of those movies that will persuade you that all the great ideas were already used in classic Hollywood and that everything that followed represents merely a deja vu.

I'll mention my objections, then why I love this movie anyway.1) New York City, specifically Greenwich Village, Lower Manhattan: A van is able to park on a near-deserted street in the middle of the Village- it is used by the three villains in the movie. Nearby, they also have a sedan parked in an equally untrafficked parking lot. In New York City, in one of the most crowded areas of Manhattan. A girl approaches a man, offering Girl Scout cookies, and the sidewalk is otherwise deserted. Does this Friday night Greenwich Village exist in some alternate universe?A 12-year-old girl, whose parents have split up and is living with her neglectful mother, is ostensibly precocious and streetwise, as one would expect such a New York City latchkey girl to be. Yet apparently she is unfamiliar with vans (never mind vans' ubiquity as delivery and cab vehicles in the city) and refers to one she sees a "a kind of squatty truck." Really?2) Stupid behavior by ostensibly smart adults. A blind woman and her husband live in an apartment in the Village- not just an apartment, but a basement (also called a "garden" apartment by savvy real estate agents) apartment, the kind most susceptible to break-ins. Yet they nonchalantly go about their business without locking the door to the apartment. Are we in New York City or Mayberry?A professional photographer, returning to New York from Canada, agrees to accept a doll from a woman, a perfect stranger, on the basis of a made-up story as both clear customs at JFK International Airport. Savvy, experienced New York City dwellers accept packages for safekeeping from strangers all the time, right?A pair of ostensibly streetwise veteran con artists wander into previously mentioned unlocked apartment, casually putting their fingerprints everywhere, on the basis of a typed note from previously mentioned doll-woman, who is their former partner in crime and whom they've been led to believe is the rightful tenant of said apartment, taking a full 10 minutes to realize that she has no typing/secretarial skills and that they've laid themselves open to being set up.3) The blind woman goes back to apartment while the three hoodlums are there, yet doesn't detect their presence.4) Timeline. Said blind woman was blinded in accident just over a year before the action in the film, yet in that time has met and married previously mentioned photographer, and they've established a pal-around routine as if they'd been together for years and she'd been blind for far longer.5) Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. To put it mildly, his presence in the film (mercifully brief; confined to a few scenes) is not an asset. He plays a thinly-altered variation of the steely-jawed, high-school-football-coach-spouting-rousing-clichés, all-American hero he played concurrently on the popular TV series "The FBI," a right-wing weekly propaganda outlet for J. Edgar Hoover and his PR department. The scenes between him and Hepburn as his wife are cringe-worthy "you can do it!" kitsch, a stereotype of the crusty-but-heart-of-gold man acting as savior to the ill and/or disabled (but typically still fully photogenic) woman. As always, Zimbalist's emotional and acting range are between A and A. Ugh. This guy's supposed to be a highly-sought-after art and professional photographer in Bohemian Greenwich Village? Ronald Reagan would have been just as convincing.6) Several murders take place on or offscreen in this neighborhood, yet do not bring the police nearby or arouse any interest of the (apparently invisible or non-existent) neighbors. But then, as I said before, this is one strangely underpopulated, nearly deserted New York City.OK, now I've gotten all that off my chest, I can discuss why I love this movie anyway. First of all, it is, outside of Hitchcock ("Rope," "Dial M for Murder," "Rear Window," the last of which shared with "Wait Until Dark" the same playwright, Frederick Knott), the best claustrophobic, within-one-small-apartment thriller in cinematic history (I'm referring to films where all or almost all of the action takes place within a tiny confined space). The pacing (aside from aforementioned, exposition-setting cringeworthy Zimbalist/Hepburn scenes) and the slow building of suspense to an unpredictable climax are simply superb.And the acting is, Zimbalist aside, outstanding. Richard Crenna as a veteran con artist does well stepping out of the nice-guy persona he had created on the TV sitcom "The Real McCoys," and Jack Weston as his oafish partner in crime Carlino is appropriately thuggish but still likable. Julie Herrod, repeating her Broadway performance, does a nice job as bratty-but-sympathetic Gloria, the tween-age girl helping the blind woman. Samantha Jones is skilled in her brief role as a glamorous and beautiful drug mule smuggling heroin across the Canada-U.S. border.Audrey Hepburn was not really exploring new acting territory (for her) as the frail and vulnerable innocent in danger (she played very similar roles in "Charade," "The Children's Hour," and, to a certain extent, in her lead debut, "Roman Holiday"), but her performance as blind woman Susy Hendrix at the mercy of three desperados is still a standout.But the biggest kudos has to go to Alan Arkin as chief bad guy Harry Roat, a.k.a. Harry Roat Sr., a.k.a. Harry Roat Jr., a cool, stiletto-toting hipster in shades and a black leather jacket who will scare the bejesus out of you. It is tribute to Arkin's range as a comedic and serious actor when you consider the three roles he played in two years' time: as the sympathetic but humorous executive officer of a Soviet submarine in the Cold War-confrontation comedy "The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming!" (1966), as the scary but entertaining sociopath Roat in "Wait Until Dark" (1967), and as the sweet, tragic, deaf watchmaker John Singer in "The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter" (1968).

I remember being show this movie on Halloween by my 6th grade teacher. we all dimmed the lights and all my other classmates were looking around at each other. We had NO idea what kind of movie we would be watching and we were all anticipated about getting to watch a movie in class.When the credits rolled I believe it was me and all my table mates that were quaking in fright after all that we had witnesses. However, I think I may be the only one who remembers it all vividly. Even to this day I'm still shocked that that movie was presented to us yet at the same time I was glad to see it. If it weren't for my 6th grade teacher I probably wouldn't have ever thought of seeing it.The acting in this movie is great and Audrey Hepburn does a wonderful job playing a blind woman. I bet that's a very hard role to play without screwing up at one point if you can see perfectly well.The shadows and the quiet yet eerie soundtrack will make you shudder at times. However, even if you're not into Thriller, Crime of Horror, your eyes will always be glued to the screen.