On Jul 20, 6:36 pm, David Oberman wrote:
> Treadleson wrote:
> >Absolutely. This is practically a horror film and much worse than the
> >post Chainsaw horror because it's much closer connected to the real in
> >terms of people, locale, who Mitchum is and because to think of little
> >kids this chased and victimized that way is to think of the worst
> >terror there is. The film operates on terror and extreme emotion.
> >You feel the pain of the boy when Peter Graves is being busted. You
> >feel what he feels around Mitchum's psychotic rage. But there are
> >also moments in the film that are unusually poetic, such as the kids
> >up in the barn watching Mitchum's silhouette on horseback crossing the
> >rim of the horizon singing, "Leaning" and the boy saying to Pearl,
> >"Doesn't he EVER sleep?" This show is highly stylized, but to my way
> >of thinking anyway, much more real in terms of the characters. Ruby,
> >the orphans, Gish, and Winters falling for Mitchum as she does are
> >characters everyone can relate to, unlike so many contemporary
> >characters that don't seem to exist in the world I travel through.
> >It's true that the victim/prey analogy in the animal world are
> >overdone, but the owl (who really resembles the boy) swooping down on
> >the rabbit is pretty effective and reminds about the closer
> >relationship with the land back in that Penn./WVa. corner where it's
> >set. And then there's Gish underwater in her Model T, her hair
> >swirling and getting intertwined with the river weeds. Very powerful.
> >Very modern.
>
> Nice summation. "Hunter" seems to me deliberately theatrical; even
> more, I think its meaning is in its theatricality, & in the way it
> plays variations on theatrical conventions & schools. I've always
> loved the production design & the extravagant & stagey sets, which
> appear in isolated instances among the visual realism of most of the
> sets. I think "Hunter" influenced Spike Lee (in movies like "He Got
> Game" & "Do the Right Thing"). Plus, I think you can draw connections
> from Dieterle's "Devil & Daniel Webster" & Sam Wood's "Our Town" to
> "Hunter."
...
> In terms of look & sound, these movies combine theater
> traditions (the "starkness" of the American rural landscape) with
> American music (particularly hymns & folksongs) & the comedy of
> European absurdists like Ionesco (Mitchum's yelps & rangy movements).
And a German UFA look.
>
> ____
> I will wage war against destiny!
>
> -- Beethoven
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