Don’t Bother to Knock

Based on Mischief by Charlotte Armstrong

featuring

Marilyn Monroe, Richard Widmark, Elisha Cook Jr., Anne Bancroft,

Nell, a sullen, suppressed spirit more tempted than temptress, is hired to babysit a suburban brat in a Manhattan hotel. Jed, a pilot on layover, sees Nell as an easy landing and glides over to room 807, a bottle in his pocket. Charlotte Armstrong probably didn’t have Marilyn Monroe in mind when she created Nell (or maybe she did: Nell’s last name is Munro); however, Monroe infuses the character with the vulnerability inherent in Nell’s history of mental illness. Armstrong’s novel Mischief (1951) is heavy on parentheses; that’s where the thinking happens, showing that Nell is not the only unstable soul.

Judy Bloch
FILM DETAILS 
Screenwriter
  • Daniel Taradash
Based On
  • the novel Mischief by Charlotte Armstrong

Cinematographer
  • Lucien Ballard
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 35mm
  • 76 mins
Source
  • Criterion Pictures
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For now #9 (article), For Now, Manny Farber

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