NIGHT TIDE – The DVD Review

Review by Sam Moffitt

When you are a true movie geek some titles become a sort of Holy Grail. When I was a monster kid growing up in the 60’s I read Castle of Frankenstein magazine avidly (one of the greatest magazines ever published by the way!) That periodical discussed so many movies that I just knew I would never get a chance to see, foreign films, independent films, odd ball avant garde’ experimental films, it made me determined to see them by any means necessary.

I recall reading about Night Tide in Castle of Frankenstein and wanting to see it very badly. I didn’t get to view that title until sometime in the 90s. I found it on vhs on the Rhino label and was happy to finally get to see it, it lives up to its reputation, for me anyway. Now I am happy to report Image’s dvd is light years ahead of the vhs release. The black and white images look about as good as a movie shot in black and white in 1961 is ever going to look. The image is crisp and clean, the grey levels superb, the picture is slightly letter boxed and the audio is the only problem. This was a film shot almost completely on location and the sound is hollow and garbled in places, still all the dialog is understandable.

Night Tide gives us a very simple story, a lonely sailor, played by a painfully young Dennis Hopper, on liberty in Venice, California is attracted to a young lady who works as an attraction on the boardwalk. Mora, played by Linda Lawson, wears a mermaid tail and sits in a tank which makes it look as if she is underwater. When Mora says how much people pay to see her you have to wonder how she can live off those kind of earnings, even in 1961.

Night Tide owes a bit to Cat People in that Mora may or may not actually be a mermaid, she also has a habit of her boyfriends turning up dead. Johnny the sailor is warned about this by Luana Anders who helps her father run the merry go round on the boardwalk, but Johnny, a typical sailor goes ahead and pursues Mora anyway.

Night Tide is not really a horror movie, instead of outright scares Curtis Harrington and his small crew build a sense of uneasiness, of eerie goings on in a world that is slightly off kilter. Hopper is actually quite good as a naïve Navy man from Denver whose parents are dead. Hopper was raised in Kansas and the part seems to have been written by Harrington with him in mind. The loneliness of a sailor on liberty is so accurate in the beginning of the film it brought me a lot of heartache. Having spent four years on active duty in the Navy I really felt that I had “been there and done that.” Hopper’s uniform looks accurate and properly maintained. We never see him on a ship or even on the gangway of a ship, something that may have been out of reach for the budget.

Hard to believe this is the same Dennis Hopper who turned into such a drunk and drugged out walking bucket of human excrement later in the 60s and through the 70s, check out American Dreamer if you want to see what a mess Hopper became. To be fair he cleaned up his act, and then did some of his best work as an actor and a director before making his exit and has always been a fascinating character.

Even better is Linda Lawson as Mora. We can see why Johnny would be attracted to her and not give Luana Ander’s character, who is obviously attracted to Johnny, a chance. Mora seems to always be listening to an inner voice, she never seems totally there but just a bit, strange. Mora even tells Johnny herself that he doesn’t know what he’s getting himself into, tries repeatedly to warn him away. As a shipmate told me during my own Navy days “don’t let your dick do your thinking for you!”

Linda Lawson has an exotic, almost Asian look to her, she brings an obvious intelligence and a sincerity to a part that could have easily been laughable, especially when we get a glimpse of her “tail” in certain scenes.

Johnny follows her home and she won’t ask him up but promises to make breakfast for him the next morning. Her apartment is sundrenched and airy and has a beautiful view of the Venice beach. Her apartment is full of starfish and seaweed and fish nets and in a key moment she tells Johnny she “collects things from the sea” while he stands in his dress white uniform surrounded by these oceanic collectibles.

In the one misstep in an otherwise excellent little film Johnny dreams that Mora has turned into…. a giant octopus, (I guess), he struggles with something with tentacles on her couch. Whatever it is it looks way too much like the octopus Ed Wood and his crew stole to use in Bride of the Atom, Johnny moves but the tentacles don’t.

Johnny and Mora go scuba diving and Mora tries to kill Johnny underwater, or maybe not. Johnny is so shaken he goes awol and in the finale all is explained as the shore patrol come to pick Johnny up and take him back to the fleet.

I hate to give out spoilers, so I’ll just say that the “explanation” at the end is about as goofy as the ending of Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. Everything we think we know about the characters is turned topsy turvey. But there is still a good chance that Mora was exactly what she said she was. And that is part of the unsettling and eerie part of a remarkable little film. The only film, especially from that time period, I can compare Night Tide to is Carnival of Souls but that is more of an outright horror film.

Still both films are disquieting and the effect from watching them lingers for days. And yet Night Tide, because it is black and white and does not have the shock and outright terror of modern horror films a great many film fans will probably give it a pass which is sad, they’ll never know what they are missing. Night Tide is a gem of low budget, independent film making and great for viewing in the Halloween season.

Image’s DVD has the original trailer and a wonderful commentary by Director and Writer Curtis Harrington and Dennis Hopper, one of the best commentaries I have listened to yet. I highly recommend watching the film in one sitting and give it some time, then watch again with the commentary, both men have terrific memories of making the film and Hollywood lore in general.

I’m going out to the beach for a swim, anyone care to join me?