Charles Laughtons The Night of the Hunter (1955) blends film noir, Southern Gothic horror, and psychological thriller in a haunting story of a murderous preacher hunting two children for stolen money. With Robert Mitchums iconic LOVE/HATE villain, it remains a visually stunning, dreamlike classic equal parts fairy tale and nightmare.

Criterion Collection

The Night of the Hunter incredibly, the only film the great actor Charles Laughton ever directed is truly a stand-alone masterwork. A horror movie with qualities of a Grimm fairy tale, it stars a sublimely sinister Robert Mitchum as a traveling preacher named Harry Powell (he of the tattooed knuckles), whose nefarious motives for marrying a fragile widow, played by Shelley Winters, are uncovered by her terrified young children. Graced by images of eerie beauty and a sneaky sense of humor, this ethereal, expressionistic American classic also featuring the contributions of actress Lillian Gish and writer James Agee is cinemas most eccentric rendering of the battle between good and evil.

The Night of the Hunter was restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive in cooperation with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc., with funding provided by Robert Sturm and The Film Foundation.

Från IMDB:
A self-proclaimed preacher marries a gullible widow whose young children are reluctant to tell him where their real dad hid the $10,000 hed stolen in a robbery.

TWO-BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

New digital transfer made from 35 mm film elements restored by UCLA Film & Television Archive in cooperation with MGM Studios, with funding provided by the Film Foundation and Robert Sturm, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack

Audio commentary featuring second-unit director Terry Sanders, film critic F. X. Feeney, archivist Robert Gitt, and author Preston Neal Jones

Charles Laughton Directs The Night of the