Two years ago, I watched Whatever Happened to Baby Jane for the first time and I loved it. Bette Davis showed what a true movie great could do, twisting the character she portrayed in real life into a deranged and sad fading starlet on screen. Since seeing it I have many times returned to her back catalogue and last year I got hold of All About Eve, a tense tale about an up-and-coming ingénue who befriends Davis’s aging Broadway star and slowly climbs her way to the top.
Tonight, Screen Cinema in Dolier Street continues it’s season of classic films with this 1950 gem. Feel free to join us at 8pm in the lobby before the film, which starts at 8.30pm. All About Eve will also play on Wednesday at 6.30pm.
The young woman of the title, who ingratiates herself into the celebrity lives of Margo Channing (Bette Davis) and her friends is Eve Harrington, played by Anne Baxter. Though both Baxter and Davis were nominated for the Best Actress Oscar in 1951 (which neither won), for me the film belongs to Davis. Through her, we watch Eve finagle her way into Margo’s life and home and ultimately her career as a Broadway star. While most of those around her are oblivious to the devious Eve until it is too late, Margo is seen as paranoid and crazy until she is finally driven truly mad by Eve.
Of course, the movie is All About Eve and Baxter is brilliant in the role. She slides so easily between overly sweet, goodie-two-shoes to duplicitous schemer without effort. A scene where she attempts to win over one of Margo’s friends in a bathroom towards the film’s end had me shouting at the screen in anger.
The film is a touch too long and, if made today, would be tightened up a bit. But, if made today, I wonder if it would lose some of it’s subtlety. There is something so wonderful about watching the old style Hollywood send itself up in such a clever way. Margo, Eve and Lloyd Richards (played by Hugh Marlowe) make many flippant and derogatory references to the soul destroying Hollywood.
When writing and directing this movie, it’s clear that Joseph L. Mankiewicz (who later went on to direct Guys and Dolls and Sleuth) was telling more than a simple story - this was an age when celebrity was new and fanatics were only beginning to emerge. It is more an allegory of the state of 1950′s Celebrity Culture than a simple story about a young girl trying to make it big. It is perhaps the subtext that has made the story and the film a classic. While times, styles and Broadway’s buildings have changed, this Broadway story is still as relevant today as it was in 1950.
With some great supporting roles, including a small but perfectly suited role for a then relatively unknown and extremely young Marilyn Monroe, this movie deserves all the praise that has been lauded upon it over the years.
I’m very protective about this movie and it annoys me somewhat that Marilyn’s image, as super lovable as she is, features so heavily on any reviews or reports (and even the DVD cover) when she has such a teeny tiny role. A great role but tiny. In she saunters and attempts to steal the lime light of Davis & Baxter.
I know what you mean, but if they need to use Monroe to promote this film and get it seen by more people, then so be it. It’s wonderful.
That was a LOT of fun to watch on the big screen. We should make it a weekly or even bi-weekly classic cinema trip.