Mommie Dearest (1981)

Very well executed

Absolutely Fantastic

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

You'll hate this movie if you watch it as a serious drama. Watch it as a comedy, and you'll see why i love this movie.Faye Dunaway in her greatest comedic performance ever!

Have heard and watched a lot about screen legend Joan Crawford of late and just checked out this classic biography picture from 1981 in which Faye Dunaway(in a far out and well done take)portrayed Joan at her wicked and ego type best! Based on a book by Christina's Joan's adopted daughter the viewer sees the verbal and mental abuse that little Chris takes from Joan a lady with ego and fame problems as the alcohol and men relationships, and pressure for stardom took it's toll and it clearly caused Joan to take it out on her little girl in a mean and sadistic manner. It's like she's a she monster! From the scenes of beatings with coat hangers to cutting up dresses to choking incidents this Joan was one wicked old woman! The classic Dunaway is memorable as she nails it as Joan it's a wicked and cruel picture to watch, yet it's a view if you want to see what the real wicked witch Crawford was like.

The movie may be a camp classic, ("Christina, bring me the axe"; "No wire hangers...EVER!"), and it is terrible but who can deny Faye Dunaway's tour-de-force. She may not always look that much like Crawford, (Dunaway never looked like anyone other than Dunaway), but her performance goes way beyond mimicry. I have no idea how true any of it is; we have to take Christina's word for it but we don't have to rely on this to know just how tough a cookie, (and how big a bitch?), Joan actually was and Joan certainly gets into her skin. Unfortunately the movie never aims high enough and we are very much in "Valley of the Dolls" territory here. Four writers may have been two or three too many and the director Frank Perry was probably not the right man for this kind of material. Still, he managed to get a couple of remarkable performances from his two Christinas, (Diana Scarwid and 10 year old Mara Hobel), though the men, especially Steve Forrest, are mostly terrible. It certainly enjoyable both as a piece of over-the-top trash and as an example of a very fine actress going a long way to making a silk purse out of a sow's ear. It's also a classic cult movie.

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.