Joan Crawford dwells in my memory as the maniacal mother in Mommy Dearest. The difficulty occurs while envisioning a young and beautiful Crawford revealed in the trailer, and challenging to perceive the mutation of a future villain in her gracious disguise.
We learn her true nature from the book, written by her daughter, and made into a movie starring Faye Dunaway (tip: if you're ever transported to the past, never hang up clothes with a wire hanger in the vicinity of Crawford) and all her early work appears extinguished by this reveal.
The film tells a story, old as time, of a woman aspiring to marry for money. The story can yield two options, she actually falls in love with the rich man, or there's a poor man lurking about the kingdom, and she falls in love with love and money be damned.
Crawford has the rich man and the poor man loving her, what's a girl to do, live in splendor or live without.
I'm assuming she favors the poor man, since sympathetic feelings for love is infinitely Hollywood, and their stance on the "happily ever after" theme.
Two critics on Rotten Tomato gave a review, and one--a green splat of repulsion, and the other an intact red tomato of adulation. Mere mortals on the site gave the movie 60%, and it has a rating of 5.8 on IMDb.
I bequeath to this film a thumbs down, as I feel I would be bored to tears watching all the close up of Crawford's face and not to mention the story line. If they had thrown in a zombie or two, perhaps I might surpass my negativity and adjust the thumb into a upward position.
