Smartorhypo
Highly Overrated But Still Good
Pluskylang
Great Film overall
Mathilde the Guild
Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.
Stephen Bird
Despite "Mommie Dearest" being around for nearly a decade before I was born, I have only just now got round to watching it, and despite all the negativity surrounding the film, the leading lady Faye Dunaway disowning herself from the film, the film picking up the main prize at the Golden Raspberry awards, I actually found it to be quite charming. Indeed I must see something no one else can, as I thought "Mommie Dearest" was an awesome, powerfully moving retelling of the life of Joan Crawford and the upbringing of her two adopted children. Before watching this film, I knew very little about Joan Crawford, now I feel I've been inspired to go out and watch as many of her films as I can, it's gripped me like not many films can. The way the hair and makeup department managed to get Dunaway to look like Crawford as well as they did is pretty impressive, top marks for them..., and despite not actually being there to see whether the film and the sets are faithful to real life, it really does look legit, amazing-amazing truly.The acting is dazzling and hits you where it counts, astounding display of emotion that runs deeply throughout the duration of the film and never lets go for a single heartbeat, it hooks you immediately and refuses to relinquish its powerful grasp. I am shocked and appalled at how much bad press "Mommie Dearest" has received over the years, completely unjust and horrifically unfair, what do people really want huh? It's a good old film depicting the life and times of a good old actress, maybe the actress wasn't exactly good herself, but the film certainly is. My advice is ignore the reviews, ignore the press, and just sit down and enjoy a very stylish and exciting film, people who moan about it don't know what they're missing, for shame.
TheLittleSongbird
'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
Davis P
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.
Jakester
One tip-off to the badness of this picture is the eyebrows. They dominate every scene in which they appear. You can't take your eyes off them - they're frickin' weird, idiotic, laughable.The eyebrows provide insight into the thinking of the director and writers of this picture. They saw this project as an exercise in camp; they totally focus on Joan's off-the-charts weirdness. J.C. was obviously weird, but the creators could have made a much more interesting picture by offering a nuanced portrayal.For the record, Joan Crawford's eyebrows were not invariaby laughable and she was not always wacky. She was extraordinary. She was alive. She was more alive than 99 percent of the women of her generation. She was a handful, to use an outmoded phrase - much too interesting and vital for the hacks who wrote and directed this film.The creators could have paid more attention to Joan's courage in defying the pigs who ran Hollywood. These pigs tried to tell her what to do; she told them to go screw themselves. I'd say "Bravo!" to that but the word "bravo" apparently never occurred to Frank Perry, Frank Yablans, and their gang of idiots. The film's creators could have done interesting things with the failure of mainstream doctors to help Joan through hormonal craziness. (She had big-time hormones, no doubt about it; mainstream medicine in the 1940s and '50s had no clue how to deal with big-time female hormones; this fact remains mostly true to this day. Alternative medicine does a much better job; unfortunately for Joan, alternative medicine barely existed in her heyday.)The film's creators opted instead for wacky eyebrows and weirdness. They made a joke of Joan Crawford. The impulse to make a joke of things was common in Hollywood in the '70s and early '80s when this film was made. See, for instance, what happened to the James Bond franchise via the oh-so-funny Roger Moore and what Dino De Laurentiis did to King Kong. Some of this impulse can be tracked to the "Batman" revival circa 1966.All of that said, "Mommie Dearest" is fascinating if you're obsessed with show biz and can't get enough of the backstory, no matter how wackily it's presented. (I'm right there with ya.) I like the glimpses of 1930s Hollywood homes. I like many of the performances.Someone should write a decent book about how the entertainment business is portrayed in movies and on TV, examining this film, "Entourage," "Sunset Boulevard," "Tootsie," "Coal Miner's Daughter," "A Star Is Born," "Gods and Monsters," "In a Lonely Place," "Barton Fink," etc.
