Long Day's Journey into Night

1962. Dir: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Katherine Hepburn, Ralph Richardson, Jason Robards, Dean Stockwell and Jeanne Barr. ●●●○○

Written by Eugene O'Neill in the 1940's, this semi-autobiographical play was first released and produced following his death in 1953. The play was a huge hit and it often regarded as his finest work - praise indeed for the writer of The Iceman Cometh.

The plot, or what there is of one, follows the Tyrone's over the course of the day as they fight and pick at each other and turn to their own habits and rituals for comfort.

There are some additional issues for a transfer from stage to screen tat you don't have with other films, especially when the action all takes place in a single set. In some adaptations there will be additional characters, in other the action moves to different locations. In Night Sidney Lumet merely opens up the house - we see the garden and the dining room, but other than that it's purely as the play is presented.


It's a brave decision, and I think the right one. The spare room and the Doctor's office are described almost as other worlds so it would have been a let down to actually see them. On the other hand this decision makes the film feel very stagey. There's even one device at the end where the camera pans out to reveal the set as a faraway stage. This whole staginess makes the film more boring than it has any right to be.

If Boris Kaufman (cinematographer of such masterpieces as On the Waterfront and 12 Angry Men) had been given more rein to have fun like the point when the camera follows Katherine Hepburn around as she circles the room then the whole film would be improved. Perhaps if the set was interesting this could have helped, but, as Hepburn's character repeats many times it's not a home and it certainly gives no clues to indicate the places is lived in and enjoyed.

All the performances hit the right notes. Katherine Hepburn milks the slow descent into morphine induced madness but only in keeping with the charcter and Ralph Richardson makes a superb hammy miser in a performance that may just be a touch close to home. Making a huge impression as the youngest son with Consumption, and the character that stands in for Eugene himself, is Dean Stockwell.

Stockwell had been a child actor who was now graduating to adult parts, and his performance here is superb as his watches the rest of his family get drunk or high and desperately try to avoid talking about what's really wrong with themselves by blaming everyone else around them. It's certainly a wonder why Stockwell didn't get more film work, looking at his CV it seems TV was a greater calling so a potential matinee idol was lost there.

To conclude I would say that the dialoigue is riveting, the performances good and the haunting piano score of Andre Previn effectively evocative, but Long Day's Journey into Night fails to escape from it's stage past and the overall package is less than the sum of it's parts.