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55 out of 68 people found the following comment useful :-
Words Can't Do Justice, 1 September 2005

Author: brocksilvey from United States

It seems almost pointless for me to add any comments here, since everyone else who's posted has done such a great job of summarizing this film's merits, but I can't resist. How do you rate a movie like this? On the one hand, it's one of the worst movies I've ever seen: completely lacking in coherence, shameful acting, writing so bad it seems to be making fun of itself. In fact, I'm still not convinced this movie isn't supposed to be a parody of Christina Crawford's book rather than a serious attempt to adapt it to the screen. On the other hand, it's such a rip-roarin' good time of a show that I'm tempted to give it 10 stars on the strength of its sheer entertainment value alone.

Faye Dunaway gives the most jaw-droppingly mesmerizing freak out ever captured on screen, whose bizarreness cannot even be topped by Halle Berry's Oscar acceptance speech. Dunaway must have realized early on that she was a rat in a sinking ship, but instead of deserting, she decides instead to devour the crew. I don't know if her performance comes anywhere close to capturing the real Joan Crawford, but if Crawford was even a tenth of a percent as loony as Dunaway portrays her here, I would have been high-tailing it to Canada if I were either of her children. The fabulous lines, many of which are quoted on this site, can't really be done justice when removed from the context in which they appear, and you really have to see the faces of the actors as they're delivering them to get the full effect. The wire hanger scene is of course a classic, but it's really the floor scrubbing scene immediately following, with Dunaway in kabuki makeup squatting on the floor like a Sumo wrestler, that remains more memorable. Watching Joanie jog is a sight to behold, especially when she starts talking to herself and scrunching her face up as if she's imitating Alvin or one of his chipmunks. There's the "I can handle the socks" moment, one of the most seductive moments (hee, hee) in film history, and of course the coup de grace comes when Joanie tackles Christina across the coffee table and begins banging her head into the floor like she's in a women's prison movie.

The editing in this film is atrocious. There's no sense of time; events follow each other in a loosely chronological fashion, but they don't make dramatic or narrative sense. Frank Perry, the director, must have been dozing off through much of this production; either that or his film crew carried out a mutiny, tied him up, threw him in a shed, and went ahead without him. But it seems churlish to criticize a film like this for its poor film making. It's like kicking a dead horse.

All I can say is, if you watch this movie with the right people in the right frame of mind (i.e. with alcohol), you will be howling. I watched this with a group in college, and we had to periodically pause the movie in order to allow everyone to recover before continuing. Thank you, Ms. Dunaway, for giving us "Mommie Dearest." The world will never be able to repay you for your kindness.

Grade: F or A+ (depending on your perspective and level of sobriety)

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49 out of 61 people found the following comment useful :-
Woman on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, 8 August 2001
Author: TJBNYC (limboultra@aol.com)

There is no doubt that Christina Crawford's scathing 1978 memoirs did much initial harm to her late mother's reputation. The subsequent 1981 film has eclipsed even the bestselling book to become the standard by which the real-life Joan is judged. However, I'm inclined to believe that those who dismiss Joan today as a psychotic harpy and nothing more never even saw the film version of "Mommie Dearest," and only heard secondhand reports of the most infamous scene ("No...wire...hangers!").

Most tellingly, Christina Crawford reportedly hated the film version of her book, and wailed upon seeing it, "They turned it into a Joan Crawford movie!" She's right. With the exception of the two most graphic scenes ("No wire hangers" and the choking scene), Joan's "abuse" of Christina is not all that much different from what passed as "discipline" in those days--just ask your parents or grandparents--and despite Faye Dunaway's full-throttle acting, Joan always somehow comes off in a strangely sympathetic light.

What we see is an insecure woman fighting for survival in an age-obsessed, male-dominated industry. Such scenes as Joan's heartless dismissal from MGM invite sympathy; while her snarling, veritable takeover of Pepsi Co. elicts cheers for her ballsiness and strength. Christina, on the other hand, is invariably depicted as either gratingly whiny or cardboard stiff. It's difficult to empathize with such an annoying character.

"Mommie Dearest"'s grandest artistic achievement is through the impeccable art direction, which truly makes the audience believe they are watching a film unfold in the 1940's and 1950's. Its lasting legacy, however, is Faye Dunaway's career-ending performance, which, depending on your point of view, is either jaw-droppingly awful or unbelievably brilliant.

Dunaway's acting "choices" are nothing if not idiosyncratic: clutching her bosom frantically as she cries, "You...deliberately...embarass me in front of a REPORTER!"; copying the real-life Crawford's facial expressions from the horror flick "Strait-Jacket" in the axe-wielding scene; and, most famously, her odd, cross-eyed pose that she strikes not once, or twice, but three times: holding baby Christina on the staircase, rubbing moisturizer on her elbows after hiding Christina's dolls, and following her wire hanger/cleansing powder attack.

It is Dunaway's nostril-flaring, hair-pulling, bosom-clutching style that really sends this film into the camp stratosphere. On paper, such scenes as Joan swatting Christina on the butt for defying her orders, or Joan insisting that Christina finish her rare steak, would seem bland. In Dunaway's hands, they become something else altogether!

Actually, Christina Crawford should thank Faye Dunaway; if not for her crazed, unforgettable portrayal, "Mommie Dearest" would have been just another trashy Hollywood memoir that eventually would've been forgotten (does anyone really care about B.D. Hyman's book about Bette Davis anymore?). And a film version without Dunaway would've been rightfully panned, forgotten, and relegated to cut-out bins at your local video emporium. Instead, Faye Dunaway has ensured its place in film immortality. It still stands alone among camp classics, but perhaps some re-evaluation of it (and of Joan Crawford herself) is due.

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16 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Mommie Deadly: An Alternate Reality In A Galaxy Far, Far Away, 11 June 2007

Author: gftbiloxi (gftbiloxi@yahoo.com) from Biloxi, Mississippi

Given the film's current cult movie status one is tempted to believe the 1981 MOMMIE DEAREST was a critical debacle and a box office fiasco. That is not really the case. It is true that critics generally considered the film a failure, but many of them admired certain elements of it; it is also true that box office fell below expectations, but it was not a box office disaster in the same sense as the 1980 HEAVEN'S GATE or the 1981 INCHON.

It is also true, however, that audiences howled with laughter at the film when it debuted, and although leading lady Faye Dunaway received a number of critical accolades for her performance as Joan Crawford, she also received an equal number of devastating reviews--and it was these that caught the spotlight. It was a humiliating experience for an actress particularly noted for her perfectionism, and rumor has it that Dunaway feels the film ended her career as a major film star. Whatever the case, Dunaway quickly developed a strategic silence about the film that she has maintained for some two decades.

Seen today, it is easy to identify the core problems of the film. The most obvious is the script, which is extremely inconsistent in quality and yet perversely consistent in a style that can only be described as soap opera hot-house to the nth degree. This is particularly true of the dialogue assigned to Dunaway. Infamous lines such as "No More Wire Hangers Ever," "Tina! Bring Me The Axe," and "I'm Not Mad At You, I'm Mad At The Dirt" have become a staple of every drag queen from Maine to California.

But the ultimate disaster here is director Frank Perry. Joan Crawford was a larger-than-life personality; the role is written to reflect this; Dunaway plays the role as it was written. But it would seem Perry sought to heighten the effect: the rest of the cast is extremely, extremely restrained. This must have seemed like a good idea in theory, but it proves a terrible mistake in actual fact. No matter what Dunaway does with it, she can NEVER seem less than wildly overwrought in comparison to the rest of the cast, and the effect is very peculiar indeed.

The designs and the cinematography also clash in an incredibly bizarre way. There is absolutely no doubt that everything about the film is exactingly accurate: that is indeed the look of the period, right down to the very last detail. But the photography is extremely flat, and you are constantly aware that the sets are indeed movie sets, the costumes are movie costumes, and so on. Yes, it is all beautifully rendered, but you can't buy into it as anything real.

The Hollywood Royalty Edition DVD edition offers a good but by no means flawless print of the film and several bonuses. It is unfortunate that they are not particularly illuminating. While director John Water's commentary is enjoyable, he approaches the film only as a fan. Even so, Water does make several telling points: many of the things that Crawford does which seem so odd (bathing the face in ice, for example) are actually commonplace cosmetic necessities for movie stars; many of the things the film treats as abuse were, although carried to wild extremes in the story, typical of child-rearing practices of the 1940s and 1950s.

There are also three short documentaries featuring a number of cast members, most notably Diana Scarwid; these are actually entertaining for the fact that those who appear still seem to regard the film as "a good movie." The only really significant interview is with Lypsinka, an artist who has driven Crawford impersonations to the level of wicked satire and high art, and who offers a number of interesting personal insights into the iconography involved.

Like the film itself, the bonus package has two great failures. The first is that Faye Dunaway does not appear in interview or commentary; it would be very interesting to have her own take on the film, its failures, and its afterlife. Given her sentiment, it is an understandable non-involvement; less understandable, however, that there is not so much as a potted biography of the actress--or indeed of any member of the cast, for there are no written notes of any kind.

The second great failure of the bonus package is that it contains no factual information on either Joan or Christina Crawford. There is no indication here that those who knew both women are sharply divided over the accuracy of the portraits both here and in the book by Christina Crawford from which the film is drawn. A number of people, including actresses Betty Hutton and June Allyson, supported Christina Crawford's accounts, but an equal number, including actress Myrna Loy and Christina's younger siblings, flatly stated that Christina's accusations were largely fictitious.

When all is said and done, and in spite of performances and moments that are actually extremely good in isolation, MOMMIE DEAREST is a film that falls under the "so bad it's good" category of cult films. While I am taken aback by the bizarre nature of the movie, I personally find the amusement involved almost as dark as the movie's plot; it is not among my cult film favorites. Even so, I can understand the appeal it has for others, and I give it five stars on that basis.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

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29 out of 45 people found the following comment useful :-
The Mother to End All Mothers., 10 May 2005

Author: nycritic

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Every so often there comes a movie that is so over-the-top it actually saves itself from total oblivion by the sheer force of the laughably bad performances. This one was one of the first movies to sweep the Razzies, not that Faye Dunaway was thrilled to do so, having just won an Oscar in 1977 for her brutal performance in NETWORK, but the same way that little gold guy can be a blessing, it can be a curse. If not, look at Halle Berry's career choices after her win for MONSTER'S BALL. She may still re-bound; her career is still not at a point of no return and her acceptance speech at the Razzies may be the cold water splashing on her face that will take her back to the roles she's supposed to be doing, not the ones which will garner her the "first black woman to..." status.

But not to digress. MOMMIE DEAREST was and is a camp classic de rigeur, right up there with VALLEY OF THE DOLLS. It is the CITIZEN KANE of camp. Producers must have decided that Christina Crawford's tell-all book about her mother -- in case you didn't already know it's Joan Crawford, movie star, Oscar winner, glamor girl, alleged child beater -- would make a brilliant film, and why? Well, for once, biopics featuring stars at their absolute worst weren't that common at the time this film was released, and certainly a book as sordid as this might make for a dark look into a respected actress, recently defunct. And so the casting of an actress who would embody those excesses to the hilt -- and wouldn't you know, the actress who stated years before she admired Crawford stepped into the task of turning herself to Joan from head to toe: not only physical, but in mannerisms, gowns, diction. Faye literally became "Joan Crawford" in image and style. The problem is, the script was so unabashedly exploitative and poorly written, her Crawford became a caricature, a cliché of poses that Crawford herself had created in many of her film credits. There is no real Joan Crawford here: only a repetition of lines that seem to be lifted almost directly from other movies. This Joan as a matter of fact seems to also live in her own time capsule. No mention of her 1920s or 1930s career, no mention of her marriage to Philip Barry, no mention of her later return to MGM to film TORCH SONG or her horror movie period, not even any back story of what happened behind sets in Mildred Pierce or the fact that she had to audition several times before getting that particular part (which won her her only Best Actress Oscar. No mention of her rivalry of Bette Davis (who? not in this film), either, and their one movie together, WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? This is all fantasy, seen even more clearly with the inclusion of a completely fictional lover (played awfully by Steve Forrest) and housekeeper Carol Anne (an equally bad Rutanya Alda) and not to mention the horrific performance of Diana Scarwid as Christina Crawford who has some sublimely bad scenes filled with beyond terrible lines. (It made me wonder, was the actual Christina there as a consultant, and if she was, how does one explain how moronic she becomes as the movie progresses to the point that we actually side with Joan?)

Then again, this not being an autobiography nor a book of accounts of actors who knew and worked with Crawford but an amateur attempt at writing, huge inaccuracies were bound to happen. And to portray interminable, disjointed scenes of Crawford gone mad, brutalizing Christina for no other reason than being wigged out -- well, I'm not sure what the director is trying to say here.

So if there's no real Crawford (older and younger), then this is all a mindless exercise in glossy excess. It's the TV biopic of the month that never was; its existence predates future biopics of similar awfulness (if not, check recent tell-all bio-pics that ABC, Lifetime, and other channels have been churning out lately on TV stars clawing each other's eyes out). It's also the precursor of trash TV: if anyone recalls DYNASTY or MELROSE PLACE or even Jerry Springer, all they have to do is rent this baby and enjoy the sublime scene when Dunaway tries to body slam and strangle Diana Scarwid (Christina as an adult) as a reporter watches in horror. Now that's entertainment!

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31 out of 50 people found the following comment useful :-
Searching - entertainingly but in vain - for Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest, 16 March 2004

Author: bmacv from Western New York

In Mommie Dearest, we watch Faye Dunaway portray Joan Crawford as portrayed in Crawford's adopted and later disinherited daughter Christina's (necessarily?) one-sided and tendentious memoir. That was less a story than a payback about growing up in a Hollywood hothouse with a headstrong and possibly unhinged star as mother. Where the precise balance lies between truth (obviously, some) and spite owing to being read out of the will is not, or no longer, the point. The point is what justice the movie does to the legendary Crawford - how accurately it reproduces her public façade and private dysfunction (where it's open to skepticism), and how well it evokes the way stars lived and were expected to live under the mid-20th-century studio system (where it fares well).

The movie opens at 4 a.m., the wake-up call for a star operating under the punishing regimen that was then the norm when shooting was underway. Dunaway/Crawford scrubs and steams herself, then closes her pores by plunging her face into rubbing alcohol on the rocks. Then she steps into a limo idling in the dark, where she learns her lines and signs glossies for doting fans. Noblesse oblige, Southern California style.

Crawford had been in movies since the last days of the silents (her first roles, uncredited or as Lucille LeSueur, were in 1925), and had since achieved a blue-and-ivory showplace in Brentwood, two ex-husbands, and entrée to the privileged circle of `Hollywood royalty'. All she wants to round out her life is a baby (or two); Steve Forrest plays an attorney and current paramour who helps her to acquire them, like a pair of occasional tables.

The rest of the movie depicts the ambivalent - almost bipolar - relationship between Joan and Christina (the actual Crawford adopted four children, whom the script cuts to two - just one, really, for son Christopher is seen only a few times tethered to his bed and once again, at the fateful reading of the will). So the plot's main thrust is Christina vs. Joan, and the semi-psychotic episodes that made the movie a cult/camp classic focus on this David and Goliath tug-of-war (`Tina, bring me the axe!' and `What's wire hangers doing in this closet?').

Several episodes, however, weren't witnessed by the skulking, passive-aggressive young Tina (Mara Hobel) or by the wilful and defiant teen-ager and woman she would become (Diana Scarwid, with a growling contralto that brings to mind Joan's adversary Mercedes McCambridge in Johnny Guitar). No little pitcher with big ears was nearby when Joan, in gingham apron and high-heeled white work shoes, scrubs the floor and bellows to the maid `I'm not mad at you, I'm mad at the dirt' or when, in one of Dunaway's rip-the-envelope-open scenes, emasculates the entire board of directors of Pepsico.

Dunaway's impersonation of Crawford is in many ways unforgettably overripe (and her performance been received as both extraordinary and execrable; she herself is on record as regretting that she did the movie at all). Yet despite an at times almost uncanny resemblance provided by makeup and costume, we seldom forget it's Dunaway on camera. The specific Crawford qualities that gave her unparalleled longevity in Hollywood elude Dunaway - they aren't quite there. (Under all the honeyed diction there's little of the tough broad from east Texas.) Maybe Dunaway was right in doing Crawford her own way, rather than resorting to mimicry. But she - and the script - lose too much of her prototype.

The script hews to known chronology in only the most slapdash way. There's a signpost at the beginning - Ice Follies of 1939 (why not the better known and just plain better The Women of the same year?) - and another at the time of her Academy-Award performance in Mildred Pierce (1945). But Crawford's subsequent vehicles, many of them hits, are ignored - and much of Mommie Dearest suggests she was a washed-up has-been. So it's never clear what juncture of her career she's reached - the late '40s and early '50s when she was still going strong, the Grand-Guignol '60s or, near the end, the '70s (Trog and TV)? It's a crucial lapse of basic narrative skills.

But Mommie Dearest eschews many of those skills, seemingly by choice. No longer, as in the movies Crawford made famous, does scene unfold into scene, does motivation shape the story line. True, real life seldom observes the dramatic unities, but events here come so haphazardly that they're baffling. A triumph like winning the Oscar or the humiliation of being fired from MGM by Louis B. Mayer (Howard Da Silva in a memorable cameo) both lead straight into full-tilt rampages. Do they occur the same day, or weeks or months later? The time-line's too shaky to tell. Nor do the drastic mood-swings ever get explained (maybe they can't be explained), though Crawford's ever-present flask of vodka threads through the movie more as a colorful eccentricity than a central fact of her life.

And in expressing this instability, Dunaway plucks not from Crawford's roles but from Gloria Swanson in the last, loony half of Sunset Blvd. Her eyes turn inward while fleeting emotions flicker across her face, hinting at something dreadful dredged up from her psyche. Yet Crawford held on to her star power in a ruthless industry for close to four decades, then snagged Pepsi-Cola CEO Alfred Steele and proved to be a savvy businesswoman. Nothing in Mommie Dearest accounts for those facts, which makes its accounting practices a little bit suspect. It's not a very good movie, but, thanks to Dunaway and her subject, mesmerizing nonetheless.

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18 out of 25 people found the following comment useful :-
"Why can't you treat me like I would be treated by any stranger on the street?", 23 February 2001

Author: moonspinner55 from redlands, ca

"Because I am NOT one of your FANS!"

Simply said, this is superb trash. Enjoyable b.s. Faye Dunaway lobbied hard for the role of Joan Crawford (Christina Crawford wanted Anne Bancroft) and she admirably sinks into the part with relish. I loved the opening montage of "Joan" preparing for her day early in the morning: scrubbing her hands and nails, numbing her face in ice cubes, leafing through a script in her car, getting made-up, and then whirling around in her chair and letting loose with a breathy, "Let's go!"... Sadly, Frank Perry's direction is awkward and unsure, cutting off some sequences before they're allowed to build and letting other scenes ramble on. The movie doesn't do justice to the riveting book by Joan's adopted daughter Christina, committing to film the book's highlights, the talked-about bits where Crawford freaked out, but skimping on the details. We learn absolutely nothing about Christina's many tormented years in an L.A. Catholic Boarding School (we see her check in and we see her check out). Joan's marriage to Pepsi czar Alfred Steele and her three other adopted kids are also given the short shrift. What we do get with "Mommie Dearest" is pure, unadulterated Faye. She acts up a storm and revels in these primal opportunities. It's one of the highlights of her spotty career. **1/2 from ****

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33 out of 55 people found the following comment useful :-
Drama? Maybe... The world's funniest comedy? Yep!, 17 April 2002
Author: Poseidon-3 from Cincinnati, OH

Oh Lord, Here it comes..... This is the big one. Never before has there been (and probably never will there be again) a camp monstrosity as huge as this. An over-the-top "true story" about Christina Crawford being adopted, raised and tormented by the legendary film star Joan Crawford, the film is an amazing exercise in excess. Virtually every line in the film is a quotable hoot (and legions of people can almost recite the script!) It is an overabundance of comedic riches. It's almost impossible to pick a favorite scene. First, though it is likely that certain aspects of this film have a seed of truth, there is no way that this is an authentic film biography.......NO WAY. So, while a few incidents are loosely derived from fact, most of it is guilt-free hilarity. Christina's book was striking, but contained nothing as wild and vicious as this film presents. And it's entirely probable that some of Christina's memories were exaggerated by childhood perspective (although there's no denying that her mother was an obsessive, neurotic, steamroller of a woman.) Even Tina explained, in her book, certain aspects of the bad behavior which shed some light on Joan's actions. None of that is presented here. For example, the infamous rare meat scene...the film doesn't disclose that Joan paid high black market prices for the beef (during wartime rationing) and was appalled that Tina turned her nose up at it and wasted it. Also, the violent night raid scene is actually a compilation of two different occasions, etc.... The film tries to maximize and sensationalize everything and over-do everything to the point where it turns comic. Dunaway (who has, herself, described her mesmerizing and ferocious performance as "Kabuki") is beyond fascinating to watch. She imbues the role with an intense, stunning magnetism which blows everyone else off the screen. It's amazing that the sets were left intact! Despite an explosive, unforgettable performance, Faye actually looks almost nothing like the real Joan Crawford. Her eyes are not nearly large enough and nothing is done to make them appear so, her eyebrows are ridiculous, her chest is not as pronounced as Joan made hers and her hair is almost never the way the real Joan wore it! And both women have HIGHLY unique voices, but which are not alike at all. Still, she radiates all the necessary star quality for the role. Anne Bancroft would have LOOKED the part more, but who knows what the film would have been like? Better? Duller? It certainly could not have been wilder! Highlights of the Faye Dunaway circus act include: the legendary cold cream-faced night raid with the iconic screech, "No Wire Hangers!", her tirade with the scissors when she catches Tina mocking her, her showdown with the boarding school principal, the resultant wrestling match with Tina back home and the magnificent face-off with the Pepsi Board of Directors. It would be impossible to list the many quotes which make this film required viewing (only the surface has been scratched in the Memorable Quotes section.) "I fought worse monsters than you for years in Hollywood. I know how to win the hard way" immediately followed by "Don't F*CK with me fellas!! This ain't my first time at the rodeo", isn't a bad start. Too hilarious! Young Hobel really holds her own as Tina and though Scarwid is less successful as grown Tina, she still gets in a few good licks. In any case, the film has provided untold hours of enjoyment and allowed for some instant bonding whenever people start spouting off the hilarious lines. WHEN is someone going to adapt this into a stage show?!

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19 out of 31 people found the following comment useful :-
Awarrrarragh!!, 25 September 2004

Author: Spuzzlightyear from Vancouver

Indisputable classic of the highest order, 'Mommie Dearest' just SCREAMS cult hit every chance it gets, and just about ruined Faye Dunaway's reputation in the process. Mind you, there's nothing WRONG with Dunaway's performance, as a matter of fact, it's really good, but what's so good about it is how she plays every scene with fearless abandon, whether it's the wirehanger scene, the departure from MGM or chokeslamming Christina through a glass table, Dunaway gives 100% percent! And you should too! The first half is MUCH more frenetic then the 2nd half (aka young Christina vs Old) and the first part has all the best bits, but not to say the 2nd part is good too, it really starts to mellow out and (gasp) you start to feel SOME compassion to the old broad. Diana Scarwid is good too, although her playing what looks to be a 13 year old girl looks a bit too much.

This wasn't my first time at this rodeo (I'd seen this before) and I enjoyed it as much as I had the first time!

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10 out of 16 people found the following comment useful :-
"Hollywood Royalty Edition" DVD Resuscitates Crawford Camp Classic Embodied by an Overcommitted Dunaway, 27 June 2006

Author: Ed Uyeshima from San Francisco, CA, USA

Even though she was the first runner-up for the New York Film Critics Award, Faye Dunaway disavows her performance as screen icon Joan Crawford because the camp following this 1981 potboiler has developed over the years has probably been overwhelming. To put it mildly, she is certainly watchable. However, every line she utters seems to have an exclamation point, and every gesture feels so grandiose that it's hard to figure out just what empathetic qualities Crawford had to engender her long-standing popularity. The glibly titled 2006 Hollywood Royalty Edition DVD package makes no bones that this is a movie that now caters to its huge gay following. Dunaway's snub in participating (as well as director Frank Perry's death) means having flamboyant director John Waters pinch-hit on the commentary track, and he manages to be both funny and insightful as he shares lots of apocryphal gossip and zingy one-liners to bring a whole new flavor to the execrable film.

Among his many errors in judgment, Perry decided to film the story of Crawford's mid-to-late years (or more appropriately, her adopted daughter Christina's version of it) as if the movie was one of Crawford's own overripe films. The problem with his serious-minded approach is that it veers so unpredictably back and forth between soap opera and pure camp that the only consistency is its artifice. The story begins as the movie star's career is in free fall at MGM in 1939 (when she was forced to film a true atrocity called "Ice Follies of 1939"). Aware of her professional dilemma, Crawford decides to adopt a baby regardless of being a twice-divorced single career woman. With the help of her studio lackey lover Greg Savitt, she adopts a daughter and later a son. Forever the publicity hound, Crawford presents her happy family in the most pretentious manner in front of the Hollywood press, yet hides a streak of cruelty that manifests itself into military-like parenting and savagely violent episodes. Not living up to her mother's exacting standards, Christina is shuttled off to boarding school and then convent school. She grows up to become a struggling young TV actress, as her mother becomes a corporate wife-turned widow slipping deeper into alcoholism.

Perry makes a fundamental mistake in switching the film's narrative perspective from Joan to Christina midway through the film. The consequence is that neither of their stories is fully told with any objectivity, especially what could have happened in Crawford's earlier years that would have led to such excessive behavior. Instead, we are given an endless parade of over-the-top moments – the tree chopping, the tile scrubbing, the wire hangers, the out-of-control strangulation - that the movie is simply too exhausting to keep up with the episodic storyline. With her reasonable resemblance to the movie star in full make-up, Dunaway carries herself confidently within the Crawford public persona and even achieves some remote moments of poignancy in between the shouting matches. Her strenuous efforts at verisimilitude, however, push her into an unsavory, demonic level of commitment to the larger-than-life role. It's too bad that almost everyone else is quite awful by comparison – Diana Scarwid frustratingly wooden as the adult Christina, Rutanya Alda irritatingly earnest in her blind devotion as Crawford's confidante Carol Ann, Steve Forrest looking like aged beef as Savitt and Howard Da Silva merely smarmy as MGM studio chief Louis B. Mayer. The one exception is little Mara Hobel, who brings genuine cunning to the younger Christina.

The Hollywood Royalty Edition includes three dishy featurettes. The 14-minute "The Revival of Joan Crawford" shows the genesis of the movie from Christina's red-hot best seller with contributions from Scarwid, Alda and producer Frank Yablans, who speaks candidly about Dunaway's tempestuous perfectionism. The 14-minute "Life With Joan" focuses on Dunaway's total absorption in the part during the stormy production and includes an extended opening sequence that was deleted before release. The 16-minute "Joan Lives On" speaks specifically to the film's cult status with Waters and Crawford impersonator Lypsinka providing particularly comic insight to its gay following. There is also a photo gallery and the original trailer. It's truly for lovers of cinema camp.

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2 out of 2 people found the following comment useful :-
Always nice to see rich famous people are as crazy as we common folk :P, 15 October 2006

Author: Arlis (mellow@tricomcorp.net) from KY- United States

Well so I had always wanted to see this, but didn't know much about it. I could care less about Joan Crawford or her freaky deaky family, but I watched WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE and was reminded again that I should see Mommie Dearest.

I watched it and was AMAZED by how much Faye looked like Joan. Crazy people on the message board said they looked nothing alike - They look just alike to me. That was an automatic hook.

I've heard the chronological aspect of the film was off, but I can't judge it for that because I don't know much about that, I can only comment on what I know.

First let me say that I loved Faye Dunaway and many of the other actors. The little girl, although might've been OK as an actress, she was a bratty person who I didn't like. The direction wasn't impressive but the use of color was absolutely wonderful, some of the shots were great simply because of the color matches, especially the scene where Joan first gets the baby and walks to the top of the stairs.

The story was just the right amount of pity, love, hate, insanity, respect and madness. You could'nt help but feel sorry yet relate to both the mother and the daughter.

It was a nice movie and I think it blended Drama, horror and a touch of comedy all together. Comedy wasn't intended, but hey who didn't laugh at the "NO MORE WIRE HANGERS" part.

Watch it and you'll like it, it's a tad long but you won't be bored for long, its entertaining.

6 out of 10 stars.

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