I had long been interested in checking out this low-budget fantasy; as soon as I learned of writer/director Harrington’s passing, I ordered it and another horror title of his – RUBY (1977). I was afraid that the 1999 Image/Milestone DVD (in a snap case!) would have gone OOP by this time, but I got lucky. Anyway, I loved the film: it was Harrington’s first feature-length effort (and the best that I’ve watched from him); of his remaining work, I’m most interested in the psychological thriller GAMES (1967) – which has never been shown in my neck of the woods and, regrettably, is still M.I.A. on DVD – though I should be getting to his sci-fi concoction QUEEN OF BLOOD (1966) fairly soon.
While watching NIGHT TIDE, I was reminded of other arty (though small-scale and independently-produced) cult horror items from that creative era – such as DEMENTIA (1953), CARNIVAL OF SOULS (1962) and INCUBUS (1965). Richard Valley perceptively remarks in the DVD liner notes that the film presents what is probably cinema’s only wicked mermaid: the aquatic legend at the core of the narrative – with the compulsion it places on the girl concerned to kill her current lover, and the intermittent appearance of a mysterious older member of the ‘species’ (who greets her in a foreign tongue) – is clearly influenced by CAT PEOPLE (1942), the Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur classic (incidentally, lead Dennis Hopper is seen here following the so-called ‘Water Witch’ played by Cameron, an eccentric figure with artistic and occult leanings popular around this time – could this be an inversion of the celebrated night-time stalking scene on New York streets from CAT PEOPLE?). However, the film can also be defined Hitchcockian – sharing its enigmatic female lead with VERTIGO (1958) and featuring a PSYCHO (1960)-ish explanatory ending.
The cast is interesting: it’s refreshing to see Hopper playing wholesome, rather than one of his trademark psychotics; Linda Lawson is quite striking as the mermaid girl; Gavin Muir is imposing in an ambiguous role (originally intended for Peter Lorre!); and Luana Anders likable in the small but touching part of ‘the other woman’. Thanks to its dreamy cinematography by Vilis Lapenieks (though an uncredited Floyd Crosby did the studio interiors), the evocative carnival/sea-side setting (partly filmed at Venice Beach, which I visited a number of times while in L.A. in late 2005) and a fine score by David Raksin, the film is turned into a hypnotic mood piece. Especially effective are the quirky scene early on in which seagulls are compulsively attracted to Lawson’s bizarrely-decorated apartment (thus anticipating Hitchcock’s own THE BIRDS [1963]!); the hero’s nightmares which see Lawson metamorphose first into an octopus and then into Cameron herself; the scene in which Hopper finds Lawson mysteriously tied to the pier; and the suspenseful climax (following the girl’s ‘inexplicable’ underwater attack on Hopper, the latter confronts Muir at his tent and is shown Lawson’s drowned body, while being threatened with a gun – then we cut away and, on resuming the scene, find that Muir has been disarmed).
A quotation from Edgar Allan Poe’s “Annabel Lee”, in which the title is mentioned, concludes the film; incidentally, Roger Corman (director of several cinematic adaptations of the author’s work) helped raise finance for it – and Harrington himself twice filmed “The Fall Of The House Of Usher” as a short subject, made at a distance of some 60 years from one another! By the way, while NIGHT TIDE was first shown at the 1961 Venice Film Festival, it wasn’t officially released in the U.S. until 1963; as if to make up for this, Harrington proudly states that the film has often been revived over the years – chiefly through the copy he personally donated to Henri Langlois of the Cinematheque Francaise!
The accompanying Audio Commentary is something of a letdown, being a laidback conversation between star and director (who have remained friends): however, both tend to be sketchy about several of the details pertaining to the shooting – and, too often, lazily resort to merely pointing out the locations used for any given scene!
Finally, both the “DVD Drive-in” and “DVD Savant” reviews mention Harrington’s early short work as being in a similar vein to his debut feature; one wonders whether this will ever be more readily available, particularly now that the director’s gone.
