"A CRY IN THE NIGHT" - Film versus Novel
Posted by HJ
Owen Clark (Richard Anderson) and a lovely teen-aged Liz Taggart (Natalie Wood) are parked in Lover's Lane when Anderson is startled by the sound of a "peeping Tom." He tries to chase the intruder and is slugged with a lunch bucket by the intruder, leaving Liz free to be abducted!
Her captor is portrayed by Raymond Burr, who would become suave and handsome Perry Mason just a year later. His character is Harold Loftus, a 32-year-old mentally handicapped and socially retarded man with a clinging and overbearing mother, and is understandably attracted to the lovely Liz Taggart, whose father is a tough cop named Dan Taggart (Edmond O'Brien).
Captain Ed Bates (Brian Donlevy), the commander of the night shift at the police station, is pressured by Taggart to find his missing daughter after the dazed Owen Clark is found by a patrol car inspecting Lovers Lane. Owen Clark is initially thought to be just a drunk after an attempt by another couple in Lovers Lane to revive him with some booze leaves him smelling like a distillery, but the police Doctor (Peter Hansen) realizes that Clark is just concussed and that Clark's car and girlfriend are both missing.
In my opinion the most impressive character in this movie is Raymond Burr's Harold Loftus. To me the character is a mixture of Lenny ("Of Mice and Men") and Bo Svenson's 1973 made-for-TV "sympathetic" Frankenstein monster characterization. Loftus is genuinely frightening violent psycho who can switch from one personality to the other at the drop of a hat. Raymond Burr's dramatic ability and large expressive eyes make him a well-chosen actor to portray Harold Loftus. He's just a big somewhat retarded guy whose contacts with women have been limited by his possessive and overbearing mother, and any attraction he has felt to women nearer his own age has resulted either in his rejection and embarrassment by the women or browbeating by Mom Loftus.
O'Brien and Donlevy both do a fine job with their roles, but make no mistake: This was Raymond Burr's movie! Natalie Wood (age 18 when this movie was made, I believe) shows promise of the fine actress she would become, but she's primarily there to furnish her beauty and appeal, of which there is plenty!
I recently bought and read the novel by Whit Masterson from which this movie was
In the book, Loftus is a married man with a whiny and unattractive wife, and his mother doesn't figure much in the plot. And rather than the somewhat retarded "Mama's boy" of the movie, Loftus is a frustrated would-be rapist who really hasn't thought out his capture of the girl and subsequent activities very well. His short-term planning is frustrated by unexpected events.
The Liz Taggart character, who tries to "handle" the "retarded" Loftus in the movie spends almost all of the book unconscious and figures very little other than as a lust object for the would-be rapist Loftus. And her boyfriend Owen Clark in the book wants very much to participate in the rescue of Liz, but is despised and kept out of the action by Dan Taggart.
So, basically the outline of the novel is retained by the movie but the specifics are altered quite a bit to make maximum use of the emerging star Raymond Burr and the beautiful and very promising Natalie Wood.
In my opinion, a very worthwhile movie, but also an interesting novel. Both are worth a visit!