Word: arkin
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Ever since his first appearances with Chicago's improvisational Second City troupe, Alan Arkin has been doing a series of disappearing acts. The authentic Arkin vanishes into a part, never to be seen again. Like Peter Sellers, he has ample physical credentials for a cab driver but rather odd ones for a star. His blunt, anonymous face was born to grouse behind a steering wheel. His voice - often hidden behind a Puerto Rican or Mittel-European accent - is a grainy urban product, like soot. His hair is rapidly disappearing; his walk is a series of slumps...
Audrey Hepburn as the housewife is totally appealing. Her physical frailty is a genuine asset here, and she deserves an award just for keeping her "blind" eyes looking in the proper direction throughout. The real acting coup is Alan Arkin's. As a homocidal-sex maniac, Arkin is bone-chilling. His use of sunglasses, an eventual plot element, helps prevent associating him with the lovable sailor of The Russians Are Coming...
WAIT UNTIL DARK. A blind woman (Audrey Hepburn), the nearly helpless victim of a trio of terrorists led by Alan Arkin, tries to even the score by removing all the light bulbs in her house but forgets the one in the refrigerator-with chilling results...
WAIT UNTIL DARK. A blind woman (Audrey Hepburn) who has become the nearly helpless victim of a trio of terrorists led by Alan Arkin tries to equalize the situation by removing all the light bulbs in the house; but she forgets the one in the refrigerator-with chilling results...
Still, Audrey Hepburn's honest, posture-free performance helps to suspend the audience's disbelief. She is immensely aided by the heavies: Jack Weston, Richard Crenna, and Alan Arkin playing his first straight roles-triple portrayals of a Peter Lorre-like psychopathic killer, a white-haired father and his smarmy son. With virtuosity, Hepburn and Arkin collaborate to revive an old theme-The-Helpless-Girl-Against-the-Odds-that has been out of fashion since Dorothy McGuire and Barbara Stanwyck screamed for help in The Spiral Staircase and Sorry, Wrong Number. If Hollywood is still counting money...