"Still of the Night" is one of the more obscure entries in Meryl Streep's filmography, even though it came out in 1982 in between two of her greatest films, "The French Lieutenant's Woman" and "Sophie's Choice". (Until it turned up recently on British television I had never previously seen it or even heard of it). It is a psychological thriller, directed by Robert Benton who had earlier directed Meryl in "Kramer v Kramer". It has often been described as having been influenced by the works of Alfred Hitchcock, and one of the obvious signs of this influence is the fact that the main character, like the heroine of "Spellbound", is a psychiatrist. (Hitchcock was fascinated by psychology and psychiatry, and often makes reference to them in his films).

Another Hitchcock touch is the idea of the "man in the street" who suddenly finds himself in trouble or in danger. When one of his patients is murdered Dr Sam Rice, a Manhattan psychiatrist, finds himself becoming emotionally involved with a young woman named Brooke Reynolds, who was not only a colleague of the dead man but also his mistress, and who is also a suspect in his murder. The plot is a complex one, involving Rice falling under suspicion with the police, who believe that he may be withholding evidence about the killing, and his placing himself in danger by his own attempts to solve the crime.

The film makes quite deliberate reference to a number of Hitchcock films. Besides the general psychiatric theme, there is also a dream sequence reminiscent of the one in "Spellbound". The appearance of a bird during this sequence is a reference to "The Birds" and possibly also to "Psycho", where Norman's hobby is stuffing birds. A fall from a bell tower recalls "Vertigo" and, as in "North by North West", there is a scene set in an auction room. (The murdered man, George Bynum, was a senior employee of an auction house). There are also scenes reminiscent of "Rear Window" and "Marnie". Jessica Tandy who plays Rice's mother (also a psychiatrist) appeared in "The Birds". Many of Hitchcock's films, including "Notorious", "Strangers on a Train" and "Psycho", feature a strong, dominant mother-figure.

Perhaps the most effective Hitchcock touch is the use of a trademark blonde heroine. Although this is far from being one of Meryl Streep's greatest films, she nevertheless gives a very accomplished performance as Brooke, portraying a woman who is clearly disturbed and frightened and who might just also be a psychopath, while leaving (as the conventions of the thriller genre require) that second point open to doubt. Had Meryl been twenty years older, she might have become one of the Master's great muses, along with the likes of Ingrid Bergman and Grace Kelly.

And yet any number of Hitchcock references do not in themselves make a Hitchcock film. "Still of the Night" falls along way short of the great man at his best, or even at his second-best. Roy Scheider does not make a very charismatic hero and, except perhaps in the final sequences, Benton never succeeds in generating the sort of nail-biting tension that Hitchcock was so skilled at conjuring up, even in some of his lesser films. Whereas Hitchcock could normally relieve that tension with some effective use of humour, "Still of the Night" is a pedestrian and humourless film, no more than an average eighties thriller. 5/10, largely for Streep's performance.

I'll dispense with the Hitchcock references, almost everyone else on this board already does so. I viewed it as a murder mystery, suspense thriller that did an interesting job of teaming Roy Scheider and Meryl Streep in a dubiously convoluted relationship. Scheider's can of Tab made it into the flick a number of times, enough that I thought that it's product placement went just a little overboard. The key to identifying the killer in the story hinged on a dream that the murdered George Bynum (Josef Sommer) related to psychiatrist Sam Rice (Scheider),and from there it becomes an almost too simple matter for Rice and Brooke Reynolds (Streep) to go home as happy campers. Although the manner in which Gail Phillips (Sara Botsford) fell over the balcony railing looked kind of awkward; that could have used a little work. Roy Scheider makes for a dashing leading man, and I've never seen Meryl Streep look as gorgeous. Throw in Jessica Tandy as Sam Rice's psychiatrist Mom, and the puzzle pieces come together without much of a problem.

It's hard not to recommend a film starring Roy Scheider and Meryl Streep, especially when they deliver the goods, as they do here, and even more especially when they are both natives of the late, great state of New Jersey. But, sadly, I can't recommend it, unless nothing else is on. There are simply too many problems with it.

The story is simple enough. Scheider is a shrink. His patient, the always professorial Josef Sommer, has been a patient for more than two years (not that long by Woody Allen standards),and winds up murdered, evidently by a woman. Scheider finds himself drawn to Streep, Somer's lover, who, as is usually the case in these narratives, seems as often suspicious as innocent. Streep is a kind of assistant auctioneer at a fancy outfit called Crispin's, which has nothing to do with anything except to give director Robert Benton another chance to rip off a situation from Hitchcock. (As a subterfuge Scheider finds himself having to bid thousands of dollars for a painting he hates.)

That's not the end of the ripoffs. There's a quick reminder of the climax from "Saboteur" and a couple of others I thought were coincidental until I learned that Benton used them deliberately. As "homages", he claims. Benton must be a real macher. He practically made a career tapping into current trendy sentiments. He co-authored the script for "Bonny and Clyde" in the late 1960s when the boomers were busy bashing the establishment. When the boomers grew up, married, and got divorced, and the men had to discover their anima, he made "Kramer vs. Kramer." Running out of themes he made a tribute to his grandmother and her milieu, "Places in the Heart," which, whether he knew it or not, was about a pretty mean town.

"Still of the Night" was originally designed to be a comic slasher flick, mining that particular slurry, something on the order of "Scream," but then it turned serious, or let's say, plodding. The photography is too dark, on top of everything else. But Scheider and Streep rise above the material. As an actor, Scheider is hard to place. His background includes Shakespeare, if one can imagine, but he retains an everyman quality in his appearance and behavior that makes him easy to identify with. Although his sinewy frame looks fine in good clothes, he's of medium height and his accent too class-bound for him to pass as anything resembling debonair, and in no way could he be brutal enough to pass for another Mitchum, especially in glasses. He looks like the guy next door, only more handsome, and more capable too, as if he is perfectly composed doing nothing but reading a book but were capable of striking quickly if called on to do it. He's pretty masculine, but not too much so. Just about right.

Streep, a marvelous technical performer, is usually comely. But she is rarely as sexy, as she is here during a massage scene, lying on her flattened-out breasts, her buns coyly draped with a sinfully red towel, smiling up at Scheider and giggling at his discomfort. She's a pale, vulnerable woman who looks blonde all over.

She and Scheider do a splendid job in "Still of the Night," but to what end? It's one cheap shock after another, with an fantastic interpolated dream right out of "Traumdeutung."