metacritic.com: Night of the Hunter, The (re-release)

Starring Robert Mitchum, Shelley Winters, Lillian Gish, James Gleason, Evelyn Varden, and Peter Graves

Critic Reviews

100	Christian Science Monitor This is the only film Laughton ever directed, and he packed it with a mixture of eerie chills, ingenious suspense, and absurdist humor. It's a genuine classic.
100	Village Voice Laughton understood Agee's proximity to Grimm vaudeville, and fashioned the most intensely expressionistic movie of its day.
100	San Francisco Chronicle Part fairy tale and part bogeyman thriller -- a juicy allegory of evil, greed and innocence, told with an eerie visual poetry.
100	Chicago Sun-Times One of the greatest of all American films, but has never received the attention it deserves because of its lack of the proper trappings. Many "great movies'' are by great directors, but Laughton directed only this one film, which was a critical and commercial failure long overshadowed by his acting career.
100	Chicago Reader An enduring masterpiece--dark, deep, beautiful, aglow.
60	Variety Staff (Not Credited) This start for Gregory as producer and Laughton as director is rich in promise but the completed product, bewitching at times, loses sustained drive via too many offbeat touches that have a misty effect.