They Live by Night
They Live by Night is a 1948 American film noir directed by Nicholas Ray, in his directorial debut, and starring Cathy O'Donnell and Farley Granger. Based on Edward Anderson's Depression-era novel Thieves Like Us, the film follows a young convict on the run who falls in love with a woman and attempts to begin a life with her.
| They Live by Night | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Nicholas Ray |
| Screenplay by | Charles Schnee Nicholas Ray |
| Based on | Thieves Like Us 1937 novel by Edward Anderson |
| Produced by | John Houseman |
| Starring | Farley Granger Cathy O'Donnell Howard Da Silva |
| Cinematography | George E. Diskant |
| Edited by | Sherman Todd |
| Music by | Leigh Harline |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | RKO Radio Pictures |
Release dates |
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Running time | 95 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
The film opened theatrically in London in August 1948 under the title The Twisted Road, before it was released in the United States by RKO Radio Pictures as They Live by Night in November 1949. Though it received favorable reviews from film critics, it was a box-office failure, losing the studio $445,000.
Although the film is considered by many to be the prototype for the "couple on the run" genre and is generally seen as the forerunner to the movie Bonnie and Clyde, the first telling of the story was actually the 1939 Persons in Hiding, based on the J. Edgar Hoover memoir of the same title.
Robert Altman directed another adaptation of the novel using the original title of the novel, Thieves Like Us (1974).