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Sadly Over-hyped

Just perfect...

I'll tell you why so serious

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Wow! Have you seen Feud? Where Jessica Lange plays Joan Crawford and gives her all the humanity in all its infuriating contradictions. It made me see What Ever Happened To Baby Jane - it was like watching it for the first time, after "Feud" - and now "Mommie Dearest" - Oh dear, Oh dear - It's not that Faye Dunaway is not very entertaining, she is, but her Joan is a one note, maybe one note and a half, a caricature trying to be taken seriously. Was that the intention or was it an accident? Faye Dunaway, in a lengthy interview/tribute with Ben Mankiewicz at the TCM Film Festival, didn't mention Mommie Dearest once, nor Mr. Mankiewicz asked her about it. Was it a demand from the star, not to touch the subject? - That sounds so Crawford. Mommie Dearest, the film is like an amateur movie made by professionals. On the other hand I recommend you to check Jessica Lange's Joan Crawford in "Feud"

'Mommie Dearest' has to be one of the most difficult to rate and controversial films there is. It has its admirers but also its detractors. To me, it has a good deal to admire but just as much to criticise, but can also say safely that there are far worse films out there and that it didn't deserve to sweep the Razzie Awards (the script and directing wins are understandable, but actress and supporting actress were to me undeserved) or be on worst-film lists.Despite her Razzie win, count me as one of those who thought that Faye Dunaway was incredible. She clearly did her homework, and sounds, looks and walks like Joan Crawford, and it is a performance that's frightening and compelling. One can understand the criticisms of excessive scenery chewing, admittedly it is not a subtle performance by any stretch of the imagination but the acting style fit with how Crawford was written (one-dimensional in the first place and there was always going to be the trap of over-acting).In support, a brilliant Mara Hobel is the standout as child Christina, she throws herself into the role and one does feel sorry for her. The costumes and sets are evocative and beautifully designed, the film as far as biopics go is pretty accurate and the music score is suitably unsettling and bubbly, typical Henry Mancini.However, Diana Scarvid is wooden and looks like her heart wasn't in it and the rest of the cast are rather too restrained. Even for melodrama the dialogue is far too overwrought and the campiness gets truly bizarre and not in a good way. The story may be pretty accurate to the facts and source material, but a lot of it feels very glossed over rather than meaty and the campiness and bizarreness gets too much. A lot of it lacks clarity to the point of incoherence.Editing is also incomprehensible, while the cinematography is relatively flat and the direction is both skippy and rambling.In summary, very difficult to rate, not a particularly good film but nowhere near as bad as its reputation. 5/10 Bethany Cox

Mommie Dearest is a film based on the book of the same title written by Joan Crawford's daughter, Christina Crawford. This film and the book it is based off of tells the story of how Joan Crawford behaved behind closed doors with her children, how she abused them, had crazy/wild outbursts, which sometimes turned violent. In my honest opinion, mommie dearest is very well acted, Faye Dunaway blew me away in her brutally honest portrayal of Hollywood legend Joan Crawford. In the beginning, we are introduced to ms Crawford as a young actress, at the height of her career, working at Metro Goldwyn Mayer, no children, and two divorces. She applies to an adoption agency, but her application is denied, so she goes through some loopholes, pulls some strings, and adopts her daughter, Christina, and then her son Christopher. Throughout the film Joan is depicted by Dunaway as a self obsessed, selfish, child abusing alcoholic that never really gives her love to her children. In many scenes, a teenage Chrisrina tries desperately to gain her mothers love, but she never really receives it. The chemistry between Joan and Christina is good here and the acting is very dramatic and very intense, as it should be. I don't exactly understand some of the negative reviews this movie has received both when it first came out and over the years. I think mommie dearest is a well made and well acted film telling the very sad true story of actress Joan Crawford and her private life and strained relationships with her children with with whom she woefully mistreated. 8/10 for mommie dearest.

When Christina Crawford began tapping out her little poison pen biography, little did she know that the book and film adaptation would become cult and camp classics. Faye Dunaway doesn't ACT as Joan Crawford, she BECOMES Joan. The movie doesn't stray far from the book but what Christina Crawford wrote is acted by Oscar winner Dunaway like she was never going to act again. She might argue that after this movie, she didn't act much, and it is often suggested that she blames this film for her acting demise. Poor Faye forgets her role as Evita Peron in First Lady of Argentina and the soporific Disappearance of Aimee. These were the beginnings of her downward spiral, and I would consider Mommie Dearest a high point in that slow descent. She should embrace the film and the love of gay men all around the world that it has engendered. She delivers her lines and what lines they are...Christina Crawford's word bounce off Faye's razor tongue and then slice through her children. The lines are knives, making little cuts into the psyche of her two adopted children (Crawford adopted four but the other two are never mentioned). Many of the lines are now considered classics and commonly recited by gay men around the world, but more than that, they have reduced the multi decade career of Joan Crawford, to a series of pat clichés recited by drag queens the world over...the most famous being "No wire coat hangers EVER" However my favorite line is "I'm not angry at you Helga, I'm angry at the dirt." Joan had issues with dirt and cleanliness.Faye Dunaway gives a compelling performance, and it also proves that when she was considered one of the greatest actresses of her generation, this was not hyperbole. She is terrifying in this film and goes from controlled charm to unhinged rage in seconds. She has captured all of Joan Crawford in her grandeur and her ugliness. This film was considered, in the year it was released, the worst film and was panned and mocked. The fact is, it was ahead of it's time, and one thing we can say about Faye Dunaway, was that she took her biopic characters seriously. She didn't play dress up, she inhabited the characters. The only thing that could make this a better film is if it were a musical.