For me Bunny Lake Is Missing is one of the most underrated movies of the 1960s. Producer/director Otto Preminger’s engrossing b/w mystery about the disappearance of a little girl or may or may not exist sucks you in right from the get go. The opening credits designed by the legendary Saul Bass features one of the most haunting but ignored film scores by Paul Glass as a hand strips away pieces of construction paper revealing the film’s cast and crew.
http://youtu.be/9XwegEKlQHw
Carol Lynley stars as the harried young American mother newly arrived in London who misplaces her daughter Bunny Lake at a nursery school (or does she?); Keir Dullea is her overprotective and hyperkinetic brother; Laurence Oliveir is the doubting police inspector who begins to suspect there is no Bunny Lake when not a piece of evidence can be produced to prove her existence; and red herrings as suspects pop up in the forms of Noel Coward as a lascivious landlord who collects shrunken heads and idolizes the Marquis de Sade; Martita Hunt as the eccentric former school master who lives in the nursery’s attic writing her book about children’s fears; Lucie Mannheim as the school’s disgruntled cook who agrees to keep an eye on Bunny Lake left in the First Day Room; etc.
In 1965, Bunny Lake Is Missing opened to mixed reviews. Carol Lynley rightly complained a lot of the critics were reviewing Otto’s notorious bad behavior on the set towards actors than the film isself. A box office disappointment, both Otto and Columbia Pictures washed their hands of it to Carol’s grave disappointment as she stated that she put her heart and soul into this picture. It shows, as Carol as never been better. Her desperation to find her missing daughter turns to sheer panic when she realizes Scotland Yard doesn’t believe she exists and won’t help her. However, her look of permanent bewilderment causes the moviegoer to doubt her as well. Come Oscar time, Columbia Pictures threw all it weight behind The Collector (a film that has not held up as when it was first released) earning its female star Samantha Eggar an Oscar nomination in my opinion that should have gone to Lynley.
Only a few years after the movie was released, critics began giving it a second look and realized it was much better than thought. The new persceptive continues to this day. With Bunny Lake Is Missing now on Blu-Ray you can judge for yourself. Click on reviews from The New York Times and DVD-Savant.