Watch The Desperate Hours For Free

One of my all time favorites.

Best movie ever!

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Trio of escaped convicts, led by Humphrey Bogart, take Fredric March and his family hostage in their own home. A well-acted thriller directed by William Wyler that, unfortunately, doesn't have as much edge as it should. This doesn't even seem particularly gritty by 1955 standards and it's certainly tame in comparison to the decades of far more brutal home invasion movies. It is interesting and the cast does a good job for the most part, but it's lacking that extra something to give it the proper amount of tension it needs. I didn't even find these guys all that menacing. Plus the characters do things that just seem to make no sense other than to keep the plot going in the way the writer needs it to. It's certainly not a bad movie, and I would probably watch Bogart and March read the phone book, but I just can't help but feel that this doesn't quite click. At least for me. I really think it would have been much better if it had more of a film noir style and edge to it. As it is, it has no visual style at all and the only menace comes from threats and tough guy talk.

"The Desperate Hours" is about a randomly chosen family held hostage by three escaped criminals. The Hilliard family is an upscale "Typical American Family" whose home is suddenly taken over by Glenn Griffin (Humphrey Bogart), his brother Hal (Dewey Martin) and the brutish Sam Kobish (Robert Middleton).The father Dan Hilliard (Fredric March), mother Ellie (Martha Scott), daughter Cindy (Mary Murphy) and son Ralphie (Richard Eyer) are living in fear for their lives at the hands of the convicts. It seems that Glenn Griffin is out for revenge against the cop who arrested him years earlier (Arthur Kennedy).Producer William Wyler creates a suspenseful couple of days within the Hilliard household. The family is allowed to function normally with Dan and Cindy going to work and Ralphie to school while Ellie remains at home the prisoner of the men. Cindy's boyfriend Chuck Wright (Gig Young) suspects that something is wrong. Dan is forced to comply with Griffin's demands in order to protect his family.This film is arguably the best of Bogart's later films. His character of Glenn Griffin is not unlike his portrayal of "Duke" Mantee in "The Petrified Forest" (1936) where he holds a group of people hostage in a remote diner. I believe that Spencer Tracy was originally supposed to play the March role but withdrew due to illness.Although both March and Bogart were a little too old for their respective roles the scenes between them are electric as each tries to outsmart the other. The character of the daughter Cindy is supposed to be 19 years old so you might say that Gig Young in his forties at the time, was also too old to be her boyfriend. Minor faults as the actors convincingly carry off their respective parts.Others in the cast include Alan Reed, Ray Teal, Ray Collins and Whit Bissell as various cops and Beverly Garland, Joe Flynn and Burt Mustin in smaller roles.An excellent thriller.

The Desperate Hours: a title and a film suggesting a condition quintessential to existence. This film is essentially about class distinctions and the burdens that accompany each social stratum. Wyler belatedly begins his interest in the common man in this noir-ish thriller, The Desperate Hours. However, Wyler does not completely renounce his previous bourgeois subject; rather, The Desperate Hours interestingly merges both white and blue collar characters in a psychological battle of wills. The two main characters Dan C. Hillard played by Fredric March and Glenn Griffin played by Humphrey Bogart are the presiding representatives of their class. Whereas the characters are introduced as strict representations of good and evil, their interaction with each other creates enough friction to shatter conventional character molds. The hours of desperation begin when Griffin takes refuge at Hillard's house and forces his family under house arrest after escaping from prison. While Griffin and his two other inmate fugitives have found a haven from the police, they provide little refuge only duress for Hillard and his family. However, Griffin's primary goal is not misogyny, rather money for escape. Anxiety begins for the Hillard family when Griffin trespasses upon their house, and thereafter only accentuates for everyone when the money sent by Griffin's girlfriend is impeded. Interestingly Wyler reveals that this kidnapping was not a product of mere fate. Hillard and Griffin acknowledge a past, personal relationship, yet Wyler withholds revealing their history and or the specific crimes committed by Griffin. These omissions of plot details suggest that the film is ultimately about the character struggle between Hillard and Griffin. The environment of desperation first debilitates the father and then the escapee, Griffin. While the father is reduced to submission in his own house, Griffin loses his will to dictate arbitration when his options are limited by an encroaching police force. The Desperate Hours differs from most thrillers by giving the leading man only one scene to demonstrate his emotion strength as protagonist and patriarch. While previous films have blurred emotional desperation with righteousness, few films have expressed the similarities between the good and bad pathos. Each character perceives the other as invasive and proceeds to out-smart the other. While this battle could potentially end peacefully as Bogart first promise, Wyler early on indicates that this battle will only result in tragedy. The threat of capture for Griffin and the desire for escape for March without an obvious end in sight strangles compromise and composure of these characters. Both characters despise each other, yet they reach that conclusion from using differing paths of rationale.Hillard's lucid articulation of hate towards Griffin only further confuses the role of the protagonist. Even without Hillard's misanthropic actions, Griffin seems less villainous than a typical Anthony G. Robinson character. While Griffin kidnapped and threatened the Hillard family, he never physically abused or stole from them. His reasons (albeit which are not expressly stated in the film) for using Hillard's home for a safe house seem justified as if Hillard had unduly betrayed Griffin in the past. Furthermore, Griffin refuses money Hillard attempts to give him as if he considered it bribery. Even when Griffin accepts some money he chivalrously bequeaths it to his fellow inmate brother (Dewey Martin) attempting to make a break-for-it. Unlike the tough-guy roles Bogart played in the past, Griffin is demanding, yet also weak and fearful. Despite these weak character traits, Griffin proudly states the rules of the house and the requisite punishments for violations. Griffin only on one occasion reneges on his word, yet he defends his dishonesty by citing the fallacies and lapses of integrity of his counterpart, the upper-class. Finally, The Desperate Hours uses Humphrey Bogart's star power to confuse the viewer's own moral obligation. The viewer almost has an intuitive response to support Bogart's interest. Besides the later Treasure of Sierra Madre, Bogart had only previous appeared as the tough guy protagonist instead of the antagonist. Bogart's screen familiarity and the lesser-known Fredric March progresses this film into a film-noir direction with the viewer siding with villain, yet Griffin never reaches the anti-hero status of Wilder's Walter Neff in Double Indemnity. In fact, Wyler deviates from typical film-noir tendencies by focusing on the protagonist (family) narrative rather than the prison-escape narrative. The film begins and concludes with the family narrative, while additionally exploring a few more family subplots. Moreover, the film does not glorify or sympathize with the criminal. As previously stated, this film is essentially about class distinction with the criminal representing the lower-class and the family man representing the upper class. However, Wyler does not forward any more insight into the nature of class beyond this simple categorization. The film is littered with remarks about economic subjugation, yet the film does not explore or reveal the past grievances of discrimination against Bogart's character; therefore, one is left without a historical foundation for warranting his exoneration. Without a record of harmful societal discretions against Griffin's class, one is unable to drawl a more present or significant meaning from the conclusion of the movie. Moreover, the film does not deviate from Hollywood interpretations of society- i.e. good versus evil with good prevailing in the end. Without a prior narrative to support the characters' motivations, the actors compensate the truthfulness with their performance. The film ultimately proves to be a classic story about family values and the role of the patriarch. Nevertheless, whereas the film fails to provide the audience with a more connotative meaning, the film does deliver good performances. The Desperate Hours through Wyler's direction may be perceived as a film concerned with more than just patriarchal society. Since the film revolves mostly around the characters, the film eventually becomes about the solidification of family ties not class distinctions. Ultimately the film chronicles the two main characters' ability to cope within a stressful environment. Eventually, this controlled experiment ends and yields to the pressures of the outside environment.

Superb film regarding Fred March, Martha Scott as a married couple who are held hostage by Humphrey Bogart and his motley crew along with the couple's children.The tension is so thick and is beautifully realized by director William Wyler.This is a story of inner-strength held by March and yet how his acts to protect his family could be seen as cowardice by his young son.Both March and Bogart are at the top of their game performance wise in this excellent film.The film is aided by a wonderful supporting cast including Arthur Kennedy as a detective, Dewey Martin as Bogart's younger brother and several others. Gig Young plays the suitor to March's daughter. He feels that March doesn't like him and of course this is added on by the hostage situation.We see how detrimental being held hostage can be by what it does to the normally mild-mannered March. Just view his hostile actions towards his secretary. (Helen Kleeb)While we may know how the film will turn out, we can still applaud and wait with great anticipation for its wonderful climax. This was Hollywood at its best in film making.