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ElizabethJoestar's Replies
Never noticed that and now I can never unsee it.
Thank you for writing this down. I felt like I was there. I envy your experience. The only similar experience I have ever had in a movie theater was during AVENGERS: ENDGAME where everyone lost their minds and cheered during the final battle.
What gets me is that this movie still gets that dramatic a response. I know someone who attended a screening of WAIT UNTIL DARK with an audience of about 30-40 people in 2017, and she said everyone there shrieked during the jump. Here and now, even in the cynical 21st century!
I knew about the jump going in and did not expect to be scared at all. However, by the final scene in the kitchen, I was so utterly engrossed in the characters and story that it took me by surprise. I had a damn near heart attack-- and at the time, I was a seasoned horror movie geek. I rarely get frightened watching movies, but this one is tense as hell.
I have to say, I think the reason the jump works so well is because WUD is a movie that does not rely much on such shocks to generate terror. About the only other jump moment is the bit with Roat tenderizing Carlino with the Pontaic. Also, the jump happens right after the audience falsely believes Susy is safe-- just seconds before, she was being assaulted in a darkened bedroom, which was nerve-wracking and disturbing enough on its own. The jump is timed so perfectly after all that.
I agree with you that it is hard to imagine anyone else playing this character. Robert Duvall was praised for his onstage portrayal, though I'm not sure how he went about characterizing him (I'm going to guess from critical reactions to Arkin that Duvall was not as humorous). I have never been able to picture Scott or Steiger in the part: too old, not hip enough, no humor, etc. One recent review describes Roat as like “an awful, defective growth of the 60s counterculture” and you really do need a younger actor to pull that off. With Arkin being around 32 or 33 at the time of filming, he was the ideal age.
For sure, those other actors are more physically imposing than Arkin, but once again, that's more a benefit. I can see Arkin's Roat as someone others would underestimate due to how he looks... only for them to regret it since he more than makes up for that with resourcefulness and a keen intellect.
I once read that Sean Connery was possibly offered the role. I have no clue if that's just a rumor stemming from Terence Young being the director, but I'm skeptical: it's hard to see a big, big star like Connery offering to take up what is essentially a supporting role to another big, big star. I'm not sure what he would have been like in the role-- though like Arkin he has the benefit of being in his 30s at the time, it's hard to imagine him in the film.
Just curious, have you ever seen the 1982 TV movie WAIT UNTIL DARK? The one with Stacy Keach as Roat? If you have, then what do you think of his interpretation?
I loved your write-up of Arkin's performance! Roat is easily one of my top favorite movie villains. As far as "pure evil" baddies go, he's probably number one.
Good on pointing out the humorous nature of his interpretation. I think that more than anything alienated critics back in 1967 who seemed to just universally trash Arkin-- however, when I first watched the movie in 2017, that blend of menace and humor worked perfectly. I find that time has been very kind to Arkin in that regard; in fact, I've come across viewers and modern critics who think he gives a better performance than Hepburn does here (I'll say I think they're the perfect complements as pure good and pure evil, as you mention).
I think one of the other major things that makes Roat so loathsome is the intimate the nature of his attacks on poor Susy. His con targets her greatest emotional and psychological weaknesses: her implied concern about her husband growing tired of her, her fear that she's unattractive (Roat Jr. going "my wife is-- very beautiful" after Susy has talked about "looking dreadful" to Gloria a few scenes before just seems like rubbing salt in a wound), her fear that she's helpless. There's also the sleaziness of the character as well (ex. sniffing Susy's lingerie, stroking her face when interrogating her, hooking her cane over her neck and pulling her to him in what almost looks like a parody of flirtatious behavior, etc.)-- part of what gives the movie and Roat himself a slight perverseness even now is that we have this gross, violent person in the same room with someone as sweet and vulnerable as Audrey Hepburn. Arkin really did have the benefit of the most sympathetic possible victim.
CONTD.