Amazon.com Customer Reviews
 Rated 5 out of 5!
Davis shows a hilariously horrific side to her as Baby Jane.
The dark comedy "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?" is by far one of Bette Davis's best performances, gaining her an Oscar nomination. The movie starts in 1917 as child star Baby Jane Hudson is singing for her many fans an eerie, yet amusing-sounding song entitled "I've Written a Letter to Daddy," and also shows some of the behind-the-scenes events that take place with the child [and her family]. The next scene is in 1935 when Jane's sister, Blanche (played by Joan Crawford), has evolved into a beautiful woman, and also the new talent of the family; she has become a very successful actress. However, There is an accident, of which Jane is held accountable, and Blanche is crippled for life. The final jump in time is to "Yesterday" (as it is called in the movie), with Blanche in a wheelchair and Jane as her caretaker. They live in an old mansion where Blanche is blocked off from the rest of the world, and Jane terrorizes her, apparently as revenge for having to take care of the sister she hates. This current week, a television station is having a "Blanche Hudson Marathon," making Blanche more and more desired by the public to be seen. Enraged with jealousy, Jane terrorizes Blanche more than ever, starving her and taking the phone, her last "window" to the outside world, away from her. As all this unfolds, Jane goes from an old, cruel, drunken woman to a childlike maniac, trying to relive the days when she was famous. "...Baby Jane" has many turns and surprises, right until the very end. The chemistry between Davis and Crawford is, peculiarly, almost real (hmmm...). The film is not rated; however, some scenes are objectionale for children [crude language (not often) and semi-graphic violent images/sounds (often)].- Rated 5 out of 5!
What EVER Happened to Great Movies Like This?
This breathless, horrifying film is a great shocker and deliciously malicious thriller. Every second is a haunting one, drawing the viewer into the story, until the viewer can concentrate on nothing else. Bette Davis (in the most bizzare role of what can be said as an EXTREMELY bizzare but illustrious career) plays Jane Hudson, a sixty-year-old has-been child star with a fragile, six-year-old mind. She lives with her sister Blanche (marvelously played by Joan Crawford), who was believed to be crippled by Jane. Blanche was a famous actress of Hollywood's Golden Years, but was supposedly crippled by her jealous sister at the peak of her success. The two live in a decaying, thirties-style house in Hollywood. When Blanche's popularity is revived by her films being shown on television, her drunken sister decides to revive her own kiddie act. In the process, she maliciously cuts off her sister from the outside world, throwing out her telephone, serving her dead birds and rats (two of the film's most memorable scenes), and eventually tying and gagging her crippled sister, leaving her in a dark room to die. Bette Davis and Joan Crawford are said never to have gotten along at all, and in these scenes it is particularly unnerving to observe this truth on film. But most memorable is the anticlimatic scene in which it is finally revealed just how Blanche was crippled, and Jane's mental balance snaps. But for all the grotesque, haunting two hours of movie, and sickening truths revealed at film's end, the hardening finality of the film's final shot determines that the question asked at the movie's beginning could never and will never be answered: "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?".
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