Best movie of this year hands down!

Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Overrated and overhyped

Absolutely the worst movie.

Ann Lake and her brother Steven are moving into a new house, with Ann and her daughter Bunny having just moved to England from the US. The day of the move is quite hectic, as Ann also has to drop Bunny off for her first day of school. When Ann comes to collect Bunny, she is nowhere to be found. The Police are called in, but they more they investigate, the more it appears that Bunny Lake never existed.Intriguing, original drama, directed by Otto Preminger (director of Anatomy of a Murder, Laura and Exodus, among others). Great set-up with good build-up. Preminger does a great job at making you think in a certain direction, even though that direction is the lesser-trodden one. However, not brilliant. The middle section, while creating intrigue, lacks momentum. The ending feels quite clumsy, even though it does involve a great twist. There are also some jarring moments along the way, scenes where you think "This isn't necessary". The extensive Zombies coverage is the best example of this. I can only think that Preminger was trying to appeal to a younger audience.Laurence Olivier puts in a solid performance as Superintendent Newhouse (though one would expect that from him), giving the movie gravitas and credibility. Carol Lynley is okay as Ann Lake but I thought Keir Dullea, as Steven Lake, overacted a touch.Not a classic, but worth watching.

This one was predictable, silly by times and not especially entertaining. However, there are some very good actors here giving fine performances: Laurence Olivier as Superintendent NewhouseKeir Dullea (also in 2001: A Space Odyssey) as Steven LakeCarol Lynley as Ann Lakeand Noël Coward as Wilson the creepy landlord. I really didn't expect this movie to be any better than it is. I decided to watch it because one of my all-time favorite actors Laurence Olivier is in it.

Maybe I am the first non UK or US person who post a review here about this film. I think the film was for Premminger, a opportunity to show his anxiety about the fragility of the western democracy. The film was made few years after the very terrible years of McCarthy time, where the repression and persecution by political reason typical for a totalitarian state. In "Bunny Lake Is Missing" he try to show how easy the state institution can lose there function and can become a tool for abusive and repressive Ararat. It 's help us to know Otto Premminger background if we want to understand his movies. He is much more sofisticate than the usual Hollywood film maker, maybe that's the reason why he use to make theater in NY.When we watch his movies we can think from the ideological point of view he was a humanist, a kind of left-liberal. He has not really a country, he belong not really to a nation, but he is a great human. Therefore the film "Bunny Lake Is Missing" is more a subversive film than a Hitchcock copy.

Inconsistent and sometimes quite dull as a Director Preminger helms this audacious 60's genre trend of Hammer and Hitchcock, that of the Psychological Thriller. He seems to be right on the pulse of the better of these things when it collapses in the Third Act with missteps of overwrought childhood game silliness. These things are best left to the psyche not acted out on the playground for here it loses all sense of tension. But leading up to the conclusion there is plenty of stimulation both visually and from the unending parade of offbeat and creepy Characters.Things are kept centered by some fine Acting all around and a pastiche of unsettling situations. It's a rewarding Movie if the ending is anti-climatic and uneven.