Solemplex
To me, this movie is perfection.
ChanBot
i must have seen a different film!!
Intcatinfo
A Masterpiece!
Fleur
Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.
blanche-2
...and Elizabeth Taylor freaking out!Night Watch from 1973 is based on a Broadway play that starred Joan Hackett. Taylor is Ellen Wheeler, married to her busy husband John (Laurence Harvey). They currently have Ellen's best friend Sarah (Billie Whitelaw) visiting. Sarah is having a clandestine affair and sneaks out to meet him. One night, during a storm, Ellen swears she saw a murder victim in the old house across the way. Raising her suspicions is the fact that the man (Robert Lang) who lives in the guest house is digging what looks like a grave. The next day, trees have been planted on it. Ellen's past comes into play here, as she keeps remembering an incident from years ago.The police, however, can't find anything; Ellen then sees another murder victim and lives in a state of hysteria, paranoid and suspicious of everyone and everything. Her husband has a psychiatrist friend (Tony Britton) speak with her, and it's decided it is best if she goes away for a little rest.This is a fun movie, where it seems there is always a horrible storm raging. It contains elements of some other films, as mentioned above. Taylor, who at this point was making a lot of schlock, does a fine job as the unstable Ellen.I did know how this ended ahead of time, having seen part of it ages and ages ago, so I didn't have the twist-ending thrill others have had. Nevertheless, it was very entertaining.One of Taylor's better films from this period - in the hands of better director, it could have been much stronger, since the story and cast are strong. As it is, it's worth watching.
jetcityhawk
Wow! I too remember watching this film like it was yesterday! I agree that the tension/suspense builds at exactly the right pace, and the final 15 minutes were, for me, on par with "Wait Until Dark." These two movies' endings have always remained vividly in my mind - in the way "The Birds" and "Psycho" did. And God bless Elizabeth Taylor! After Virginia Woolf (discounting how you view "Cleopatra") her performances and projects were pretty up and down. This movie reminded me of what she's capable of producing on the screen. Though her performance was praised, the movie was mostly overlooked. But Dame Elizabeth...her performance was WORTHY!
moonspinner55
Elizabeth Taylor stars in this movie adaptation of Lucille Fletcher's play, which was accused of lifting elements from Patrick Hamilton's play "Gaslight"; while true in a sense, the picture often resembles another, similar woman-in-distress thriller, "Midnight Lace" (replacing phone calls with maybe-maybe not dead bodies). A married woman in England, haunted by a ghoulish memory from her past, suffers from insomnia and loneliness; her husband is always working, her best girlfriend runs around with married men, and she's left alone in a big house with a backyard that faces the the rear of a deserted mansion. During a thunderstorm one night, our heroine sees a dead body in one of the neighboring windows (the viewer certainly doesn't, which is a crafty touch courtesy of director Brian G. Hutton). Not-bad vehicle for La Liz might have stood a stronger production, as the overall results are muddy-looking and cheap. Still, we never lose interest in the main character, as Taylor acquits herself well in these shuddery circumstances. It all may seem overly-familiar to movie-buffs, though it features a twist near the climax which I didn't see coming. **1/2 from ****
Neil Doyle
I saw NIGHT WATCH on Broadway with Joan Hackett and recall being fascinated by the murder mystery and the number of suspects in a story about a woman claiming to see a murder from her window. It's the stuff mysteries are made of.Then, a couple of years later I saw the film and didn't realize I was watching the same story. It seemed familiar but there were a lot of changes. The most obvious change was the wife, played now by ELIZABETH TAYLOR, still gorgeous in the role Hackett played originally. Now Taylor was the unwanted wife and somehow that didn't ring as true.Then there was LAURENCE HARVEY co-starring and the whole story expanded to have Taylor in luxurious townhouse surroundings. The clutter of suspects had been reduced to just a few others, so that the guessing game was not quite as difficult.And yet, having forgotten most of the play, I was still surprised at the ending--and that, in itself, is probably reason enough to watch the film. It does hook you into the mystery and does come up with a surprise ending.And let's face it. It's among the better films Taylor was making at this point in her career.
