A COLD NIGHT'S DEATH

US, 1973, 74 minutes, Colour.
Robert Culp, Eli Wallach, Michael C. Gwynne.
Directed by Jerrold Freedman.

A Cold Night’s Death is a kind of Twilight Zone telemovie. Two scientists are at an Arctic research station, which is frozen in. One is doing his normal work, the other is going mad, pondering how their predecessors died. The film has echoes of such films as The Thing – and questions about research on outer space as well as research on animals on Earth.

1. The success of this telemovie? Destined for television audiences seeing it at home? The dramatic impact?

2. The significance and emphases of the title? The visual impact of the cold, the atmosphere of death? How did the audience share in the experience of cold and death?

3. Audience interest in and response to the atmosphere of mystery and suspense? The devices used?

4. The emphasis on the snow setting? The atmosphere of isolation, cold, experimentation? Death?

5. The importance of the opening and setting, the scene, opening the puzzle? Audience curiosity?

6. The nature of the mission of the two men? Their acceptance of it? Their puzzle?

7. The nature of communications to the tower station? Communications near and yet so far? The information coming in adding to the mystery? About Val’s death?

8. The presentation of the two men at work? Their different approaches to science and their jobs?

9. The experimentation with the monkeys? The presentation of the experiments? The jobs with the snow? The ordinary housework of the place?

10. The film's developments of the characters of the two men? 'What kind of persons were they? The hostility of their interactions? Suspicions and clashes? Dramatic tension? A growing atmosphere of fear building up to the final confrontation? Which incidents illustrated this best?

11. The sinister presentation of the monkeys? Their ages, the men shown behind bars as well as the animals? The names and the significance of their names? The final explanation by Robert of what had happened? The monkeys getting revenge on mankind? The monkey experiments on persons in the same wav as the men did on monkeys?

12. The preparation for the deaths? Robert's attempt at night to see what had happened? The doors unlocked, the dead monkey? Robert outside working in the snow? Frank? The shooting?

13. The eeriness of Frank being left alone? The monkey looking through the glass door?

14. How effective a film of science-fiction? The significance and threat and menace? The presentation of scientific progress and its effect on human psychology?