"Night Tide" (1961) with Dennis Hopper

I know the first Reply is supposed to be snarky but I have loved this movie for years. I own the DVD and watch it at least once a year. Thank you, OP!

OP, I guess it's just you and me. Thanks for the reminder. I'm going to watch it again right now.

Is it streaming anywhere?

Curtís Harrington is now recognized as a groundbreaking gay director.

He directed Hopper again a few years later in the entertaining space horror Queen of Blood.

This is streaming for free on Tubi.

Thanks for sharing this great film! It really draws the viewer in from the first frame.

I love the jazz club scenes, they feel very authentic.

R3 I know Amazon Prime has it, and it's in the OP link on YouTube.

Curtis Harrington was a great director. He always made really interesting films that usually featured one or two aging actresses getting a chance to play fun roles that they normally wouldn't get in regular Hollywood.

R9 a prime example of this is Harrington's "Ruby" with Piper Laurie, though it was an odd career move on her part considering she had just gotten an Oscar nom for "Carrie." It is not a good movie, but it is atmospheric and genuinely weird. Laurie plays an ex-gun moll who spends most of the film sashaying around her Southern mansion like Norma Desmond, whilst running a haunted drive-in-theater next-door. Her daughter ends up possessed at one point. The film makes little sense and is rather insane, but I do enjoy it.

I can't find proof of this (through IMDB) but I swear Curtis Harrington is in Mulholland Drive. The scene with Naomi Watt's audition scene with Chad Everett.,,

OP and R1, thank you for reminding me to watch Night Tide again. I just moved it to the top of my Amazon watchlist. It has a surreal, "off" atmosphere - nowhere near as much as Carnival of Souls, but still enough to make it fun. I love that ambiance.

And Dennis Hopper? He was really handsome in this film, at the age of 25. I think he was a handsome man well into middle age, but he was gorgeous in Night Tide.

One thing that I love about older films like these without elaborate sets is that they provide authentic documentation of what our world looked like in the past - buildings, cars, fashions, etc.

R13 Yes, great point. Film makers couldn't afford to create sets so they used real locations. Also, some early TV like The Naked City. Beautiful New York locations - buildings and storefronts that no longer exist.

I agree, R13 and R14. Sometimes, watching an old movie or TV show, I lose track of the story because I'm so busy noticing how everything looked. Admiring a woman's stylish suit and hat or the messy but vibrant look city streets had in those day, I realize I've been paying no attention to what's actually happening in the plot. That's why it can take me two hours to watch an 80 minute movie - I'm always going back and replaying scenes to see what I missed (or just to admire that suit or that street again).

I see what you mean about the similarity to Carnaval of Souls, especially the scene where he’s running around under the pier among the pilings - just like the penultimate scene in COS. Also, both set in amusement parks, both shot in B&W, and this creepy “what’s really going on” question hanging over the action.

I like "Ruby", but it kind of bothers me that the drive in is showing "Attack of the 50 Foot Woman" about 7 years before it was released.....

R17 - Maybe it’s because the drive-in is HAUNTED (per OP).

Ah......yes that could be it......at least it's an answer!

Curtis Harrington directed the thriller What's The Matter With Helen with Debbie Reynolds and Shelly Winters. I've enjoyed it many times.

Curtis Harrington's small output of films always look cheap and lurid. He ended-up directing nighttime soaps like Dynasty.

“Cheap and lurid” is a natural draw for me.

The eighties "deranged villain" roles of Dennis Hopper (Blue Velvet, Speed) make it hard for me to see through to the DH of the films at the OP and at r4.

I will persevere, though.

R23 I know! There was almost a 'sweetness' to his early performances.

Just discovered this memoir. It's out of print but available in Kindle edition.

I love the title!

^

Harrington's Queen of Blood at r4 also features DL perennial hunk John Saxon.

The director had good taste in men.

Thanks for posting the movie!

Dennis Hopper getting massage in Night Tide.

I want this poster!

This one is also fantastic.

It will put you back over 700 bucks, however.

I love how R21 said "cheap and lurid" like it was a bad thing. These were horror movies and psycho thrillers. That's a plus for movies like that.

Generally speaking any movie from before 1970 that's labeled "lurid" is a winner. After that, most movies not made by Disney were lurid by earlier standards, so the word doesn't mean much for movies from later in the 20th century.

Not to derail the thread, but as evidence of the above, I offer Homicidal (1961) - practically the definition of "lurid" at the time and a delight to watch now.

We might need a thread on lurid horror from pre-1970.

Homicidal is fantastic.

I still don't understand how Helga's staircase elevator works......the way it looks there should be a huge hole in the floor at the bottom of the steps......HOMICIDAL indeed......I do like how Richard Rust the hotel bellboy is taken in by the .... well......I won't spoil it for anyone.....

A truly underrated aesthete of cinema.

Another great Curtis Harrington flick is "Games" with Simone Signoret, James Caan, and Katharine Ross. It's a fun, twisty thriller

Watched the colorized version of Night Tide. Good stuff!

Night Tide color version.

R38 I forgot about Games! It was so new for the time. All the twists and turns - plus Luana Anders.

I love Games!

Great role for Simone Signoret and 1970 James Can was scorching.

Forget the mermaid story. I'd rather see a sexy merman.

Aquaman getting lucky with a sailor.

Thanks for thread, I’d never heard of this before and just watched it on Amazon Prime.

Florence Marly at R4 is my spirit animal.

GAMES is just a rip-off of Signoret's earlier DIABOLIQUE.

So is HUSH, HUSH SWEET CHARLOTTE frankly, but GAMES is even closer to the original.

Check out THE KILLING KIND from 1972 with hunky John Savage, Ann Southern, Ruth Roman, Luana Anders, and a young Cindy Williams. Now that movie is lurid.

Ugh, The Killing Kind is yucky. Almost a celebration of sadism and misogyny. There's nothing scary or even especially campy about it.

Dennis Hopper is a right-wing nutjob.

BYE, FELICIA.

^ He died ten years ago, r49.

And he supported Obama in '08 despite being a registered Republican, so he had some common sense on his way out the door.

But his life was really a mess of drugs and disastrous marriages.

Yes OP, I agree with your initial summary about NIGHT TIDE.

You know, I saw this on VHS in the 90's. I rented it from Kim's in NYC and there was a hand-written employee review on a little car tucked into the back of the box (as the store did in the early 90's) saying almost the same thing you did, I'll never forget it. "If you like CARNIVAL OF SOULS you'll like this spooky little love story set in a sea side carnival." Or something like that.

Over the years I found I'm drawn to this film again and again because it's so haunting and hypnotic. There's something very calming about it. I have a downloaded copy on my hard drive. I really should buy the DVD or BluRay at this point.

Thanks OP! I haven't thought of this film in years.

R51 I lived in the East Village late 80's/early 90's and frequented Kim's and know exactly what you're talking about. Those note cards! I found them extremely helpful and they were obviously written by people who loved films, particularly obscure ones. They were also honest. Sometimes they said, "This sucks! Don't rent it."

I assume you'e talking about the one on St. Mark's Place notoriously located above The Gap, at the time.

I miss independent video rental places. I used to walk my dog to one, peruse forever, settle on one, pick up a pizza, get high with my boyfriend, and watch some oddity we had no clue about since there was no internet.

It seems an almost quaint existence now.

R53 Yes, agreed. I miss these places too. Really good independent video stores were like libraries. You could also easily bump into experts of all kinds of genres, often the staff too. Everyone shared their knowledge. They were like little communities of film appreciation.

r46, Florence Marly recorded a song for Queen of Blood - a collaboration with Frank Zappa!

Does the shell talk dirty?

Forget about Dennis Hopper's ass in his pants OP. What about that movie from 1977 where he's walking around on a train NAKED and you get to see his COCK AND BALLS and his cute ASS.

Dennis Hopper as Tarzan? In a Warhol production?

Dennis Hopper plays Tarzan's stunt double.

Warhol put one of his "fey" regulars into the Tarzan role.

Warhol's Tarzan is on the right!

Hopper is sexy af in those pictures R58 and R60.

Has anyone seen Andy Warhol's Tarzan and Jane Regained, Sort Of?

I'm trying to find it, but the only streaming option looks pretty shady.

It sounds both challenging and hilarious.

Dennis Hopper has a Luke or Owen Wilson vibe about him in some stills.

Night Tide was made into a musical at the NY Musical Festival in 2017.

R64, you made DL worth coming to today.

This lanky Patrick Dunn is fetching.

The musical is coming to Hammond, Indiana next month, pandemic permitting.

I saw it in 2017 ZZZzzzzzzzzzz