Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?
Production year: 1962
Country: USA
Cert (UK): 18
Runtime: 132 mins
Directors: Robert Aldrich
Cast: Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Victor Buono
The tough, anarchic moviemaker Robert Aldrich, who cut his directorial teeth as an assistant to Chaplin, Renoir, Polonsky, Losey and others, was the chief countervailing force to the complacency of Hollywood during the Eisenhower years. He was merciless towards Tinseltown itself in three movies about the industry. First in The Big Knife (1955), a movie inspired by the brutal studio boss Harry Cohn and the left-wing actor John Garfield. Second in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962), a ripe slice of Grand Guignol melodrama, the only film co-starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, as show-biz sisters bound together by terrible secrets. Bette is a crazy, alcoholic former child-star, who's the virtual jailer of the crippled Joan, once a major star. Re-released for the 50th anniversary, this frightening, darkly comic picture is much influenced by Sunset Boulevard. The third film, The Legend of Lylah Clare (1968) starring Kim Novak, is even more perverse, but rarely shown.
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