The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

One of the greatest screen performances of all time.
Robert Ellis Miller's film version of "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" is decent and straightforward, but what makes it a classic is the performance of Alan Arkin as deaf-mute John Singer. Arkin's performance moved me to tears in 1968, and subsequent viewings confirm my conviction that Arkin gives here one of the greatest performances ever recorded on film. Why has Arkin's work in "Heart" been so thoroughly forgotten? When "Premiere" magazine a few years ago did an article on actors throughout screen history playing handicapped characters, it completely ignored Arkin, although his performance was Oscar-nominated. "Heart" also contains fine early performances by stars-in-the-making Stacy Keach and Cicely Tyson, as well as a performance (also Oscar-nominated) by Sondra Locke that far exceeded anything she did afterward. But it is Arkin who dominates this film, and those who see his performance will cherish it forever.

Read hearts not lips (recommended)
Try as he may, stranger John Singer (Alan Arkin) just can't fit in. Responding to a vacancy ad, he becomes a single-room boarder in the home of a financially challenged family. Despite his handicap, he is one of the most helpful and caring persons in this southern town he tries to call home. If others could only read hearts as well as he reads lips, his internal vacancy could be very easily filled. Nevertheless, his loneliness -- transparent to onlookers -- grows with unspoken words until it eventually becomes unbearable.

It is hard to believe that Arkin can deliver such a dramatic role without uttering a word. This is a testimony to true versatility as you compare him in WAIT UNTIL DARK. Obviously Arkin must be accompanied by a great supportive cast. And he is with Cicely Tyson delivering a powerful performance.

American Pastoral: captures the spirit of McCullers' poetic study of loneliness
No, it's not the novel, which is a multi-plotted study of four characters whose lives are symmetrically developed and eventually tied together like the themes in a sonata, all of them linked by their attraction to a deaf-mute as an alternative to a profound sense of futility, despair and, above all, loneliness felt by each of the four. The ultimate irony is that the only character who affords the others a solace from their alienation is himself the most isolated and miserable character in the story, denied even an illusory companionship when his only friend dies.

The film omits much of the confused and failed political agendas of the black Southern doctor (Dr. Copeland) and the inarticulate Marx idealogist (Jake Blount) as well as the antisocial preoccupations of the novel's unlikely, voyeuristic hero, the restaurant owner, Biff Brannon. But by focusing on the struggles of the deaf-mute (Alan Arkin) and the idealistic young woman seeking to escape from oppressive social...

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