The randomness of the home invasion portrayed in THE DESPERATE HOURS must have been a chilling experience for cinema goers in the mid fifties. This is a solid movie that unfolds well with each roll of the arbitrary dice. Bogart acquits himself nicely as the head heavy although he looks weary and shows signs of the illness that killed him a couple of years later. Fredric March is a shade too long in the tooth to be the father of that obnoxious little boy but he gives a sterling portrayal of a man protecting his home. Always amusing are the jurisdictional disputes that arise amongst competing police agencies. Stay away from the Mickey Rourke clone.
Review of The Desperate Hours
