The Star (1952) - Drama with Bette Davis

Another transcript of mine from the annals of that fun movie forum.


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THE STAR (1952) starring Bette Davis, Sterling HAyden and a very young Natalie Wood

STORY

Aging, has-been actress is in denial, for the first 3/4ths of the film, that she's no longer a top star. This film is about how she copes with the increasing signs that she is on the way out of show business.

A handsome, younger man,an ex-GI businessman, waits in the wings until she can come to her senses.

Natalie plays the actress's unconditionally loving daughter.

THOUGHTS

BD gives an outstanding performance, as usual. But other films about declining stars have been wittier and not as sluggishly paced as this one (I give you BD's own ALL ABOUT EVE from 1950).

You start to see the seeds of her horror films here. She screeches and shrieks like her Baby Jane character does later on in her film career.

And just as in her horror films, they have put so much make up on her face that she looks like a fugitive from a Kabuki theater.


The guy is 8 years younger than BD in real life, but he looks even younger because he seems to have taken care of his body and BD has not. She looks like she's having a romance with her son or nephew.


Speaking of Sterling Hayden, I don't know if I've seen him in anything else, but he doesn't seem to know how to act.

He merely spits out his lines in monotone, and I'm talking firey passionate lines that are supposed to come across as profound. He seems not to have gotten beyond merely memorizing his lines.

This makes BD's performance all the more remarkable,because she could play so well opposite someone who gives her no emotion to which to respond.



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