Themes: Woman In Jeopardy, Criminal's Revenge, Assumed Identities
Main Cast: Audrey Hepburn, Alan Arkin, Richard Crenna, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Jack Weston
Release Year: 1967
Country: US
Run Time: 120 minutes
Plot
Wait Until Dark is an innovative, highly entertaining and suspenseful thriller about a blind housewife, Susy Hendrix (Audrey Hepburn). Independent and resourceful, Susy is learning to cope with her blindness, which resulted from a recent accident. She is aided by her difficult, slightly unreliable young neighbor Gloria (Julie Herrod) with whom she has an exasperated but lovingly maternal relationship. Susy's life is changed as she is terrorized by a group of criminals who believe she has hidden a baby doll used by them to smuggle heroin into the country. Unknown to Susy, her photographer husband Sam (Efrem Zimbalist Jr.) took the doll as a favor for a woman he met on an international plane flight and unwittingly brought the doll to the couple's New York apartment when the woman became afraid of the customs officials. Alone in her apartment and cut-off from the outside world, Susy must fight for her life against a gang of ruthless criminals, led by the violent, psychotic Roat (Alan Arkin). The tension builds as Roat, aided by his gang, impersonates police officers and friends of her husband in order to win Susy's confidence, gaining access to her apartment to look for the doll. The climax of the film, a violent physical confrontation between Susie and Roat in her dark kitchen, is one of the most memorable and frightening scenes in screen history. All performances are outstanding, particularly those of Audrey Hepburn who plays a vulnerable, but self-reliant woman, and Alan Arkin, in perhaps his best role, as the ruthless, manipulative Roat. ~ Linda Rasmussen, All Movie Guide
Review
Wait Until Dark is a memorably suspenseful thriller, even more so considering that the film's action rarely leaves its one-apartment setting. Much like the work of Alfred Hitchcock -- most notably 1948's Rope -- Dark is a desolate, brutal film. Best-known for his work on early James Bond films, director Terence Young subtly builds tension until the pulse-racing climax. Much of the menace is courtesy of Alan Arkin's stellar performance. In one of his first screen roles, Arkin is so compellingly amoral that he almost steals the movie from his more illustrious co-star, Audrey Hepburn. Still, the lovely Hepburn holds her own, bringing depth and compassion to the role of the blind woman being terrorized by Arkin's smarmy villain. She was nominated for her fifth Academy Award for her performance as the innocent-yet-determined victim. ~ Brendon Hanley, All Movie Guide
In an effort to duplicate the suspense on screen, movie theaters dimmed their lights to their legal limits, then turned off one by one until each light on-screen was shattered, resulting in the theater being plunged into complete darkness.
Hepburn was nominated for both the Academy Award and Golden Globe for Best Actress, and Zimbalist was nominated for a Globe in the supporting category.
The film ranked tenth on Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Moments for its riveting climax. In 2001 the film was also ranked #55 on AFI's 100 Years 100 Thrills.
