Genres

Visitors Review

Boba_Fett1138 2012-05-22 03:37:12

Not a very well made movie.

The movie has some messy storytelling and most of the elements in themovie don't really work out.This movie certainly isn't a terribly interesting to watch. It's a bitof a psychological thriller but it isn't scary, tense or compellingenough to call it a good one. It has a good concept but the end resultis pretty disappointing.Main reason why the movie is a bit of a failed one is because of theweak storytelling. Most of the elements in the movie feel very muddled,especially the ending and at times it takes ages before somethingreally interesting to happen in the movie. It isn't exactly a dullmovie though, it's more like an uninteresting one, even though thestory itself really isn't a bad one.The characters are portrayed nicely in the story but to be frank, theywere to boring and distant to feel for. Patricia Neal, who also had astroke in real life, prior to this movie, is a good leading lady andalso good was Nicholas Clay in his very first movie appearance. He doesprovide the movie with some good moments but it all simply is notenough to make the movie interesting and recommendable enough.From a movie with Patricia Neal, Roald Dahl and Bernard Herrmanninvolved, some more fireworks was to be expected.4/10

ben-727 2012-05-21 10:27:16

A pretty and fine made movie!

I have seen this film last week on TV. I am glad that the there areEnglish subtitles so that I can clearly enjoy the dialogue. Only it ispity that the English subtitles from TCM are kind of closed captionsthat cannot be taken for recording.Different than the comment of another Dutch viewer from 2006, I findthis film a rather nice good movie. The maker has put quite somedifferent (thrilling, creeping, emotional, romantic) components to themovie, but not into deep touch by purpose. If one is specially lookingfor or fond of a particular type of movie from one of these components,one may not feel satisfied enough. However I am glad that the maker hadmade it in this way that the movie content becomes "rich" in a specialway. It makes the film as a whole quiet thrilling, creeping, emotionaland even bit romantic too. It is not boring at all, I enjoy everymoment of the movie. Making a film to a particular type/direction ofcourse is a heavy job but to combine different type of components in afine way is not easy too.The film is quite moving that I have only realized at the end that itis already a film of 110 minutes. It is not boring at all, I haveenjoyed every moment of the movie. Yes, this is not a film made foraward nomination, but both the director and the leading actors havedone a pretty good job. If you watch the film carefully you willrealize that the film is quite fine made. From their fine work, you cansee and feel the style of the early 70's British films. It is a smallbudget production, but still leaves some compelling moonshine. I simplylike this movie.The ending indeed is quite a critical way. I have never read the novel.I don't know whether the end is the same as the movie. I wonder if thedirector has extended and refined the ending for about 10 minutes more,will the ending be then a bit better than a shortcut? On the otherhand, I have the feeling that it seems that the director hasdeliberately made the ending in this stunning way that it now leaves uscrossing feelings and questions that makes the movie still time to timestaying on our mind.It may not be a top A-film, but it is a little gem which absolutely isworthing to see.I give it 7.75 out of 10.

Coventry 2012-05-17 20:03:28

Interesting, but difficult to follow

Small spoilers....I saw this movie under the title : the Road Builder. Only that title alonesounded interesting to me. I got especially interested when I learned thatthe screenplay was written by Roald Dahl. We all know that he wrote someremarkable stories, but most his most memorable work in the field ofchildren's literature. The screenplay of The Road Builder isn't really meantfor a young audience...It's a dark story and really creepy from time totime. It's very psychological and therefore difficult to follow at certainmoments. I saw this gothic suspense thriller on TCM but without any subtitles. So thedialogues were hard to follow sometimes. Especially with a rathercomplicated story. It's about a spinster, Maura, who lives with her blindmother is a large house. Their lives change when a young handyman - namedBilly - comes to live with them. Billy is charming and really helpful aroundthe house, but he hides some terrifying secrets. It seemed that Billy facedsome trauma's in his childhood years and he still hasn't put them behindhim. Thus, some nights ... Billy goes out on his motorcycle to do horriblethings. The developing of the story is really fascinating and also the terrificacting performances keep you close to the screen. Patricia Neal - who wasmarried with Roald Dahl for forty years and gave him 5 children - is reallyoutstanding in her role of shy and quiet middle-aged woman. Also the youngNicolas Clay impresses as Billy. Clay died in 2000 after a long disease.The Road Builder certainly is worth a watch when you're in the mood forseeing a scary psychological thriller or a deep character study. Just makesure there aren't too many aspects to distract you. You'll need fullattention to enjoy this movie.

cartman_1337 2012-05-17 07:53:54

Pretty good movie

Roald Dahl has always been a good story-teller, and this movie, for whichhewrote the screenplay, is no exception. It's a macabre love story with asomewhat unexpected ending. Very good acting and story-telling. I recommendthis film for all Roald Dahl fans. 7/10.

The_Void 2012-05-15 07:03:01

Excellent psychological thriller

The Road Builder is sadly not very well known, and that's a shamebecause this psychological thriller is a real gem and would certainlybenefit from being more widely seen. The film is based on a book by JoyCowley, although there were apparently some changes made to the story(I don't know what since I've not read the book). One of the moresurprising things about this film is the fact that the screenplay waswritten by popular children's author Roald Dahl, although clearly hedid also have a taste for the macabre if Tales of the Unexpected aswell as his children's book 'The Witches' are anything to go by. Thefilm is a strange love story at heart and we focus on a house inhabitedby an old spinster and her middle aged daughter Maura. Their lives arechanged one day when a young stranger on a motorbike turns up and theyagree to let him stay. The young man becomes a popular figure in thehouse rather quickly, especially with Maura. However, there's somethingstrange about him as evidenced by his sudden bursts of depression,apparently owing to the tragic death of his parents.Most of the plot takes place in a grandiose mansion and it makes for areally good location for the movie - it's very isolated and is nice tolook at. The atmosphere is very good throughout and this excellentlycompliments the plot which is thoroughly dark and largely unpleasant.The plot doesn't move particularly quickly, but it's always interestingthanks to the way that the characters are built up progressively anddirector Alastair Reid focuses on their relationship with one another.The acting is very good and the film stars Roald Dahl's then wifePatricia Neal in the lead role. She gets on well with the other twomain players, Pamela Brown and Nicholas Clay and these actors help toensure that the film works well. There's not a great deal of shockingmoments, but the way that the unpleasant happenings are handled worksvery well as it's nasty yet completely believable. It all boils down toa very good ending and The Road Builder is certainly a film with a'sting in the tail'. Overall, I really hope this gets a decent releasesoon because it's a great thriller and well worth seeing!

moonspinner55 2012-05-14 21:26:58

Echoes of "Night Must Fall", though with a moody ambiance of its own...

Patricia Neal always brings two attributes to her film performances:honesty and integrity--both of which work wonders for this derivative,somewhat moldy tale of a spinster, living under the thumb of herhalf-blind adoptive mother, who blossoms in love and independence witha 20-year-old handyman in rural England. The film, sort of a characterstudy-cum-suspense melodrama, isn't an attractive showcase for Neal,yet she gives the scenario a hearty touch and her unmistakable stamp ofdry wit. Neal's then-husband Roald Dahl adapted his script from JoyCowley's novel "Nest in a Falling Tree", pushing some of the kinkieraspects of the plot a bit far for a blue-haired thriller. Nevertheless,a visually perceptive and intriguing little movie that almost stays thecourse until the final act, which comes completely apart. Releasedunder two different titles (also "The Road Builder"), though barelyseen by anybody until the advent of cable movie channels. ** from ****

sdave7596 2012-05-13 04:50:45

Good actors stuck in mediocre film

The film apparently went under two titles: "The Night Digger" and "TheRoad Builder." I caught this film on Turner Classic Movies recently. Ihave always been a big Patricia Neal fan. The film was released in1971, a tough time for actors like Neal from the "golden age ofHollywood." The times were changing fast, and film was going right withthem. Middle-aged actors like Neal often had trouble finding film work,as producers and studios were catering to much younger audiences.Anyway, the story revolves around Maura (Patricia Neal) a spinsterwhose life revolves taking care of her domineering blind mother Edith(Pamela Brown)in a decaying England mansion. Enter a handsome handymannamed Billy (Nicholas Clay) to turn their world upside down. Billy isquite a disturbed young man with a small problem: murdering women! Weare given only small clues as to what turned him into such a maniac,seen in somewhat confusing flashbacks. Maura falls for Billy, despitethe obvious age difference. We learn she probably eventually catches onto what he is doing, although she never really says so. Theperformances are good in this film. I loved Neal especially, sheportrays the dowdy Maura with her usual intelligence and naturalabilities. Pamela Brown as the overbearing mother is also effective. Asto the young actor Nicholas Clay, he is wonderfully creepy as the theseriously disturbed murderer. The big problems with the film are thescript and the obvious lack of a budget to make this film morecredible. The script was written by Roald Dahl, Patricia Neal's husbandof that time. Apparently the back story is Neal did not really want todo the film, but Dahl wrote it for her. The story has some confusinggaps, and the last 15 minutes or so of the film is just downrightridiculous and tough to believe. This is a case of good actors stuck ina mediocre film that could have been a more worthy one.

LJ27 2012-05-12 22:29:29

I wasn't impressed

There might be spoilers here. Gonna try to keep from it but I have todescribe the plot as I heard it verses what it really was when I sawthe film. THE NIGHT DIGGER, also known as THE ROAD BUILDER, was a movieI read about that sounded interesting. It seems a spinster and hermother are in an old decaying mansion in England when a young man comesalong to stay with them and work as a handy man while also working as abuilder on a road being constructed. It seems this young guy is apsycho who also rapes and kills women and buries them in the road.Meanwhile the spinster is taking a shine to him. Sounded like therecipe for a pretty good thriller to me. Well, in spite of BernardHerrmann's score and Alex Thompson's excellent, moody cinematography,this film doesn't play out anything like I thought it would have. Theplot takes detours that really made me wonder if the director knew hewas supposed to be making a horror film. There comes one part that hasseveral people sitting around gossiping and although I imagined asuspenseful thriller where you wondered if the old woman and her motherare in danger, someone, maybe the director, or maybe Roald Dahl prettymuch succeed in killing any degree of suspense. It's almost like theydecided to shoot a scary movie and then later tried to turn it intosomething else altogether. It has gloomy cinematography and a finescore and even a kind of threatening title but that's where thehorror/suspense elements end. The movie fizzles badly and the climax isjust plain stupid. Maybe I was supposed to be moved or sympathetic orsomething but I just thought the movie was creepy for all the wrongreasons. BEWARE! BIG SPOILER!!!!Still with me? Okay, there is a sex scene with the young man and oldPatricia Neal. Luckily, you don't see much but just the thought of theyoung dude having sex with that old woman was about the creepiest thingI can think of in this entire movie. If she had been the young PatriciaNeal from 20 years before this film was made, then fine, a sex scenemight not have been so terrible but this was disgusting. When I readthe title NIGHT DIGGER, I expected a movie where Patricia Nealdiscovers her handyman's is the murderer and her having to fight himoff and struggle to survive. I imagined a pretty interesting plot whenI read the title. Be assured that there is nothing in this film that issuspenseful, scary or thrilling unless you like watching old peoplehave sex with young people, which is shot in front of a blurry lens,presumably to keep the audience from throwing up. Given the same exactactors, crew, locations and budget, I could have made a film that wouldhave had audiences on the edge of their seats until the end credits.Someone took a good premise, a good crew, great locations, sets andactors and made a boring film about a guy who kills good-looking womenand sleeps with old women who used to be good-looking. I wasn'timpressed at all and cannot recommend this film - at least not as athriller/horror film, which it was intended to be. No blood, no gore,no action. Just old ladies, psycho road-builders and boredom.

lazarillo 2012-05-04 22:58:01

Deserves to more widely seen

As others have said, this movie was written by British poet/authorRoald Dahl as a vehicle for his wife, American actress Patricia Neal.(I thought of it recently after seeing a similar American movie "HappyMother's Day, Love George" that featured Neal and the couple'sreal-life daughter Tess Dahl). The basic story is pretty good. Nealplays a lonely spinster whose domineering mother rents a room to atraveling road worker (Nicholas Clay), and Neal's character findsherself drawn to the handsome, younger man, unaware that he might be aserial killer who has buried a string of female victims along the roadhe is building. . .This definitely works as a vehicle for Neal, who is probably mostfamous for the Paul Newman movie "Hud" (even though her character inthat was supposed to have been African-American, but such a thing wouldhave simply been too incendiary in the early 1960's). She is very goodin this. Unfortunately, she doesn't get a lot of help. Nicholas Claywould later play Lancelot in "Excalibur" and appear with an all-starcast in Agatha Christie's "Evil Under the Sun", but he was just tooinexperienced here. For whatever reason, there was a plethora ofhandsome but psychotic young men in British movies at this time, andthis role might have been better played by another "handsome youngpsycho" actor like Shane Bryant or Hywell Bennett (although neither ofthem might have been very convincing as a roughneck constructionworker). If it have been made a decade or so earlier though, it wouldhave been a PERFECT role for a young Oliver Reed.The directing is also a little flat generally, but the first murder(following a motorcycle ride) is pretty inspired. The Bernard Hermannscore is not one of his best, but it does add SOMETHING to theproceedings. This isn't great, but it certainly deserves to be morewidely seen.

pljewkes 2012-05-04 11:52:02

A real treat...

A fairly engrossing thriller directed by Alastair Reid with a script byRoald Dahl. Patricia Neal lives in a decaying mansion with her blindmother (Pamela Brown). One day a young man shows up intent on workingfor the ladies as a handyman. He's that and a whole lot more, as Nealslowly realizes. The movie builds its suspense at a very deliberatepace, but it's very worthwhile. Neal is electrifying as a middle-agedwreck who realizes too late that she's given up the best years of herlife to her domineering mother. The always interesting Brown is everyinch Neal's equal in a rare starring role. They both have A LOT ofbaggage. Nicholas Clay is the title character and he comes across likea young version of Alan Bates, surly and not too well spoken. Dahl'sscript is deceptively witty, full of a bunch of off-beat touches.Bernard Hermann's score is suitably creepy. THE NIGHT DIGGER (aka THEROAD BUILDER) is a real treat.

ga-bsi 2012-04-26 08:19:10

A Good Solid 70's Psycho flick

Many people will say that this film was a botch up job of Joy Cowley'snovel, but they would be wrong. While I have to admit that the type of filming they used in the 70's isnot among my favourite, it worked well for this film because it gaveyou insight into how each character saw things. Patricia Niel was perfect as the spinster who was stuck caring for herblind and horrid adoptive mother, and who slowly but surely becomessexually aware of the young drifter, played by Nicholas Clay. Some parts of the film are vaguely confusing, but one comes to graspthem after rolling the idea around in ones mind for a while. This film was very well done for an era that produced some awful moviesthat completely butchered famous books, and used skin instead of actualacting to portray a film. The Night Digger aka Road Runner is a very watchable film, that sneaksup on you rather than attacks you head on like some psychologicalthrillers do.

2012-04-26 00:35:23

KOVE ON A MOTORCYCLE.

This review is from: The Night Digger (DVD) The Night Digger is a good psycho thriller,Patricia Neal plays Maura the adopted daughter of blind disabled Pamela Brown,along comes a young stranger on a motorcycle who is looking for a job and a place to live,Maura is not happy about it at first but she falls for the young psycho who has some issues,like killing young girls and getting rid of their bodies in various ways,don't want to give to much away but the actors are good and the story keeps your interest,so kick back and enjoy this thriller.