Pluskylang Great Film overall

Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Dotbankey A lot of fun.

Gary The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

jarrodmcdonald-1 Critic James Agee, when reviewing the film in 1944, felt it was an overwrought story made to manipulate female moviegoers. Not sure if I agree with his assessment, but I do think Bette Davis is miscast as a gorgeous woman. It would have worked better with someone like Vivien Leigh or Gene Tierney-- any actress whose beauty was obvious and too striking to ignore. Or perhaps someone like Ingrid Bergman would have done an excellent job. And maybe in place of Rains, they could have reunited her with Boyer. Joan Fontaine (in Warners' remake of THE CONSTANT NYMPH a year earlier) might also have been acceptable.But Davis just does not work for me in this role. In NOW, VOYAGER she starts as an ugly duckling and we know that even despite her metamorphosis, she still has all those ugly insecurities inside-- that's sort of what bonds her to the young girl later on in the picture. However, in MR. SKEFFINGTON there is not supposed to be any doubt that she's a confident and alluring woman. I feel what we get here is play-acting, a vainglorious actress in a less- than-noble attempt to play a great screen siren. It's just not believable at all, no matter how much they dress her up.

jeffhaller125 This really is bad. Very bad. Fanny Skeffington (Davis) is considered the greatest beauty of her era. Once you stop laughing at that you will probably love the rest. It just gets worse and worse. The ending feels like a cross between Sunset Blvd and Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? Davis' high pitched monotone is her excuse for acting this time. Hey, Scarlett O'Hara was a horrible bitch, too but she was at least an interesting and sometimes lovable one. Fanny Skeffington is a bore. At the same time, every moment Rains has on screen is memorable. He had to see that his style of acting would steal this movie from a diva. At the same time, this long and rather slow moving movie is not boring. And it just keeps shocking us with its awfulness that we are on the edge of our seats to see what next horror awaits. It is definitely a freak show.

Red_Identity I think Mr. Skeffington is probably in the lower half of Davis' filmography (of which to this point I've only seen 10, all of her nominated roles except The Star). This one reminds me too much of The Little Foxes, and Davis is required to hit some of the same notes, although there are notable differences. As it is, I think this is a watchable, decent film, worthy it for Davis really. She's still pretty great here, and her conviction is as pinpoint as it's always been. The other cast members are good too, most notably Claude Rains. And I'm surprised the film isn't titled Mrs. Skeffington, since it's really all about Fanny.

secondtake Mr. Skeffington (1944)A full blooded romance, tragic and comic, with political and personal points made for the final two years of the war against the Nazis. Yes it has Bette Davis and Claude Rains (and a huge cast of first rate secondaries). Yes it has Ernest Haller behind the camera, and Franz Waxman in charge of music. Yes the screenplay was written by the incomparable Epstein brothers (most famous for "Casablanca"). And yes it has a director who is better known for his affairs with Joan Crawford and Rita Hayworth, Vincent Sherman.Sherman surely gets the credit for pulling off all these great scenes, keeping the flow over the decades, and making the ending worth the long path getting there. But he had the best support in the world, Warner Bros. being at its studio machinery peak. And it's high drama material of course, dealing with every big topic from family loyalty to greed to vanity to true friendship to redemption. And it covers all the big historical moments (some very briefly, or with comic indifference) like WWI, the Crash, the Depression, and the beginning of WWII. The final scenes are further examples of the movies subtly (or not so subtly) pressing the case for American involvement in the war.As wonderful as Rains is in his somewhat restrained role (it is commented on that he never smiles and has sad eyes, both true), this is a Bette Davis movie. She is not only in nearly every scenes, she's goes through an incredible range of moods. She is supposed to play an unparalleled beauty, and there was some question whether she was the right kind of woman for that role. She has command, charisma, and confidence enough, for sure, but she doesn't radiate the way a Garbo does. But then, Garbo couldn't act like Davis, not by half for this kind of role, and Davis makes the story something more complicated. One of the lasting themes is how beauty depends on love, or on being loved, and so she has beauty in excess because she is loved (or apparently loved) by so many.This is a melodrama of the best kind, like "The Little Foxes" or "Now Voyager." Yes, all Davis movies. She made these stories bigger than life because she, somehow, was bigger than life. But there are a million other things to watch happening, too, from lots of snappy (and witty) dialog to a slick and fluid photography. Note, if you have time, the two steps leading from the large entry parlor of the house where most of the movie is set down to the parlor. It's here, looking up and looking down, or moving up or down, that many of the major events of the movie have their roots. Including during the last few minutes.