Les yeux dans les ténèbres

Sure, it's pat and simplistic in places and the plot's a little daffy, but it has three major things going for it: an amazing dog named Friday, a delightful performance from veteran Edward Arnold and fine direction by Fred Zinnemann. It could've easily been filler, but Zinnemann has too much respect for his craft and the material to allow that to happen.

As others have pointed out, that dog really is something and nearly steals the show but Arnold is every bit as good. He is particularly amusing in his role within a role where he pretends to be an eccentric, ill-tempered uncle in order to foil the bad guys' dastardly scheme. (And that scheme is a big time McGuffin, no more than an obviously slight excuse to get all the conflicting characters under one roof.) Arnold's Cat & Mouse games with main villains Katherine Emery (resembling Mercedes McCambridge both in looks and delivery) and over-educated "butler" Stanley Ridges are tense and clever.

Zinnemann really shines in one ingenious scene set in a pitch dark basement. Arnold, playing a super smart blind sleuth growls "In the dark! In my kingdom now!" and proceeds to outwit a trigger happy thug. Not unlike the Coen brothers' "Blood Simple" 45 years later, the only light is provided by a number of randomly fired gunshots. Not surprisingly, this technique is effectively taut and unnerving. If you weren't aware who the director was at that point, it's the sort of thing that makes you go running to your film guide thinking "Whoa. Who directed this?"

Edward Arnold plays blind detective Duncan Maclain in "Eyes in the Night," a 1942 MGM film directed by Fred Zinnemann that has a lot of other familiar faces.

Ann Harding made her return to the screen after a few years in this small film, playing the stepmother, Norma Lawry, of a young actress, Barbara (Donna Reed at 21), who's fallen in love with an older actor with whom Harding was once involved.

Norma wants Mac to help her convince the actor it's best to steer clear of Barbara. Norma's husband is in Washington presenting a formula to the government that is critical to the war effort.

Unfortunately, the actor turns up dead, and Barbara sees not only his dead body, but her stepmother, when she arrives at the man's apartment. Norma goes running to Mac for help. He sets out to find the killer, and it leads him into a web of espionage.

Nice job by Zinnemann, who was just starting out, though he didn't like doing the film except for working with Ann Harding and Donna Reed. As others have mentioned, his pitch black gun battle with the only light coming from the fired shots is most effective and portends the great things to come from him. Overall, it's an okay story, well done.

Edward Arnold does an excellent job (though Zinnemann said he kept blowing his lines) as the smart and likable blind detective, who is aided by an assistant (Allen Jenkins) and his dog Friday, who looks to be a German shepherd mix.

Friday is unbelievable - what an actor and athlete! That dog had some training. Zimmemann didn't agree. Friday, who was descended from a silent dog star named Flash, apparently was only good for one take, becoming bored easily. In fact, Friday's only film appearances are in the two Duncan Maclain films.

Besides Reed, one can spot Rosemary DeCamp as Vera the maid, Stanley Ridges as the butler, Stephen McNally as Vera's husband Gabriel, Mantan Moreland as Mac's butler, and I honestly thought Katherine Emery WAS Mercedes MacCambridge. Wow! Even the speaking voice.

This was intended as a series for MGM, but the studio only made one other. Universal took the fat man detective series from the radio and made a film with J. Scott Smart with an early appearance by Rock Hudson directed by William Castle, but never followed it up. Nevertheless, there's something about these fat detectives, going back to Nero Wolfe, I guess, that's appealing.

Enjoyable. Glad Friday was able to keep his date after all.

What a gem of a movie! A blind detective, a Nazi plot and the smartest dog I've ever seen all make this a very enjoyable mystery/thriller. Young Donna Reed really is stunning and Mr. Arnold nails it as the blind detective. Great acting all the way around and some plot twists keep you watching. Enjoy it.

With an interesting plot, some suspenseful sequences, and a very effective performance by Edward Arnold, "Eyes in the Night" deserves to be much better known. Although its story contained a wartime message, as a whole it rises well above a mere message piece. It has numerous strong points, and not the least of them is director Fred Zinnemann, who scores a success in one of his earlier full-length features.

Arnold heads up a good cast as a blind but very resourceful detective, and he makes the character both interesting and believable. The story gives Arnold a lot of good opportunities, and he makes the most of them. The suspenseful basement sequence could almost have served as a prototype for a similar though much more elaborate sequence in the Audrey Hepburn classic "Wait Until Dark".

Ann Harding, a young Donna Reed, and Reginald Denny are also in the cast, and while they and the other characters cannot compete with Arnold, they all do a solid job. But the standout of the supporting cast is the dog 'Friday', who gets some of the best moments, and who performs very well.

The fast-paced story begins as a murder mystery, but as things slowly become clear, the last half focuses more on espionage and suspense. The story has its less plausible elements, to be sure, but it is all entertaining. It is just as good as a number of other movies from the era that are much better known, and it is well worth the time to watch.

Happened on this movie entirely by chance, while skipping through the limited offers on local daytime TV. Decided to sit it out (I'm a sucker for 1930s and 40s black-and-white films) and was very pleased I did. This movie is a thriller of sorts, and it has a major twist: it features a blind detective - quite convincingly, I must add, since he has a very smart (scene-stealing) seeing-eye dog to help him. The story has enough action, suspense, and surprises to keep the viewer interested until the very end. It isn't Hitchcock, but it's very nicely done. Recommended.