Watch Daddy's Gone A-Hunting For Free

Powerful

I'll tell you why so serious

A Masterpiece!

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Brit beauty Carol White ("Some Call It Loving") stars as Cathy Palmer, a newcomer to San Francisco. Almost immediately, a stranger named Kenneth Daly (Canadian actor Scott Hylands ("Death Hunt"), receiving an "introducing" credit) contrives a way to meet her. Initially, he seems quite charming, and they enter into a relationship for a while, until he starts revealing himself as a major league turd. She breaks it off with him, even aborting the baby that he had fathered. She moves on, and finds a new guy (Paul Burke ("Valley of the Dolls")), a rising politician, and gets pregnant by the new guy. Trouble is, Kenneth is not going to let her go unpunished. He begins to terrorize her, demanding that she kill her baby in order to atone for the death of his child."Daddy's Gone A-Hunting" may be best known for the theme song (with music by John Williams and lyrics by Dory Previn), but in fact this is a pretty decent movie, albeit with some flaws. It's kind of a mixed bag, with a lead character who's not terribly sympathetic, a script credited to Larry Cohen ("The Stuff") and Lorenzo Semple, Jr. ("Flash Gordon") that has lines both bad and good, a lack of complete credibility, and performances that are uneven. It does get better and better as it plays out, leading to a seven minute finale high above the city streets that will actually have people catching their breath. Director Mark Robson, who'd started out crafting some fine psychological black & white horror for producer Val Lewton, and graduated to bigger things like "Valley of the Dolls" and "Von Ryan's Express", handles things with a certain degree of style. The filmmakers don't seem too concerned with making viewers choose a side in the still-contentious "pro life" vs. "pro choice" debate, and mainly focus on making an entertaining, slick, tried-and-true revenge thriller.Ms. White is lovely to look at, but doesn't make her character all that interesting. Hylands is fine, having a little more to work with; Kenneth supposedly was prepared to become a better man upon learning of impending fatherhood, so he takes the abortion thing VERY hard. Burke has little to do in the grand scheme of things. The very fine supporting cast includes such familiar faces as James Sikking ('Hill Street Blues') and Barry Cahill ("Coffy") as FBI agents, Mala Powers ("Cyrano de Bergerac") as Cathy's friend Meg, Walter Brooke ("The Graduate") as Jerry Wolfe, Mathilda Calnan ("Silver Streak") as Ilsa the maid, and Dennis Patrick ('Dark Shadows') as the abortion doctor.Excellent location shooting and an effective pace help to make this reasonably engrossing, and worthy of another look from genre devotees.Seven out of 10.

This film is like a fun bad TV movie. It has a thrilling story but the film is marred by the stale performances by the lead actors. If you've never heard of Carol White it's no wonder. She is sweet but gives her part no energy. Her line readings are flat and don't add any life at all to this thriller. She looks like a bargain basement copy of Julie Christie but with out the charm. This seemed to be her big break in Hollywood after having had some success in England. Here she displays why there was no reason she would ever become a star. Why was she cast in this? There must have been countless other actresses who could have brought some fury to character. This part required a bit of madness and Carol was just too ordinary to deliver. But I suppose a film featuring abortion was a sensitive subject then and perhaps bigger stars did not dare take the part.The early scenes of the film seem contrived and trite when the characters meet. The changes that show time progressing are quite corny and dated but the late sixties fashions are cool. Carol White, though, looks short with that heavy hair-do which gives the impression that she has no neck. The film picks up after the dreary first half. There are some neat twists and turns that keep this film from being totally forgotten. The ending is exciting even though the lead actors don't show any tension in their performances. You can't tell if Carol White is terrified or ready to do anything to help her baby. Her character goes to great lengths plot wise but you could never tell by looking at her face. So, over all it's fun and chilling thriller thanks to the plot but not the actors.

This movie could have been made today; it withstands the test of time. It's about a man who wants to take revenge on a woman who aborted their child. The movie is also about the hypocrisy of the woman who is living a lie, trying to conceal a past which includes illicit sex, pregnancy, and abortion, the latter so that she could get end the relationship with the guy who wants the baby and wants to marry her. After she dumps him she marries a local up and coming politician and gets pregnant and this time gives birth. The movie is about how the first guy cleverly re-injects himself into her life through her husband and then plots to get her to kill her own baby which to him is perfectly logical because if she could kill his baby, then why not her husband's? Of course, problems ensue as the tension between the guy and the woman becomes obvious and soon she has to confess her past to her husband and the husband is loving and supportive and it's just a matter of time before the guy gets his just deserts, which is quick and violent. The movie's premise works because the guy does have cause to be angry and the story is set before Roe v. Wade, when getting an abortion was (and still is) a serious matter, not only morally but legally, and when the right of a woman to control her reproductive options was not yet fully established as a matter of law. Hence she really had no one to turn to with which to discuss her issues, especially the police, since abortion was a criminal act. As for the guy, he has no one to turn to for support either, knowing what his ex-girl friend had done. This movie dramatizes why the decision to have an an abortion has to be treated entirely as a medical matter. The alternative, to treat it as a criminal matter, just creates more problems, especially in the area of conflict resolution. Carol White gives a powerful performance as the woman and Scott Hyland's performance is compelling as the guy whose mind becomes twisted by righteous indignation, with tragic consequences.

I hardly see how this qualifies as an endorsement of right-to-life politics. Apart from very superficial charm, the father (Kenneth) has no redeeming features whatsoever and, on top of that, he goes out of his way to menace the baby Cathy has with her husband. In fact, early in the picture (during the oh-so-mechanical exposition setting up the "thriller" part of the movie), she seems reluctant to have the abortion and willing to go home to London, presumably to have the baby there and raise him/her with the help of family. It's only AFTER Kenneth learns about the baby, proposes to Cathy, is rejected by her, slaps her across the face in public and threatens to stalk both her and his child-to-be that she decides to have the abortion, presumably to get Kenneth out of her life once and for all. The abortion sequence itself doesn't show much, but it's hardly glamorized as a "choice." If anything, the movie makes it clear why many women have abortions because that "choice" is the best one among a series of bad ones.The abortion angle in the plot, however (pre Roe v. Wade), is one of the movie's few really interested angles (as well as the use of San Francisco as a backdrop).