![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
All About Eve
Oct. 27th, 2006 09:17 amHad a real life scare yesterday, which fortunately turns out to have a moderately happy ending. Phew. So, before I hop on yet another train for the rest of the day, some thoughts about a classic I finally got around to watching: All About Eve, directed and written by Joseph Mankiewicz, starring Bette Davis and Anne Baxter. As anything written by either brother Mankiewicz (the older one being Hermann, aka he who wrote Citizen Kane, or co-wrote with Orson, depending on whom you believe), the dialogue is superb, and given Joe M. was also a fabulous director and had some excellent actors at his disposal, the performances rock. And yet, though I'd recommend it to anyone, this particular film leaves me with some complaints.
Praise first: given that one of the issues of this film, who only doesn't belong in the "Hollywood on Hollywood" category because the action takes place in the theatre world, is the way actresses are forced to stick with the juvenile lead role if they want to get work at all, it's good to see Mankiewicz puts his money where his mouth is, because this is one women-centric picture, with the plum role going to Bette Davis as Margo Channing, who gets to say in on screen dialogue she's 40, the most important supporting role going to Celeste Holms who is Margo's contemporary and thus also in the 40-something category (and the script doesn't pretend otherwise). I have no idea how old Anne Baxter, who playes Eve, the title character and main antagonist, was when she shot this, but she's supposed to be in her early 20s and looks around 30, which is okay. In a nice irony, the one genuine young, really young actress is one Marilyn Monroe, appearing in what is little more than a cameo but nonetheless an oddly touching scene. The menfolk are there to support, be argued over or manipulated by, with one exception, but they're not nearly as important, and it's significant that the one exception is played by the reliably sinister gangster film pro, George Sanders. One one level, the whole film is a biting satire on the "a star is born" cliché and sentimentality, because Eve, who follows that audience familiar route of naive adoring young thing making contact with established star, rising while established star declines and finding humility and talent rewarded by becoming star herself, using her award acceptance speech to thank past star, is really a cool ruthless manipulator who orchestrated the entire rise. Her lovable humble young ingenue persona is a careful construction, based on a realistic estimation of what men (and women) will respond to. She really is a fantastic actress.
Margo, the role Bette Davis won the Oscar for, is something of a contruction herself, and she knows it; but her diva persona has become so much part of her that she has trouble to decide whether there is anything else left. Which leads me to where my one, and major problem with the film is. I think Mankiewicsz was in a bit of a tight spot, given the production code of the time. He couldn't let Eve get away with it unpunished, though the logic of the story demanded that she should; on the other end, Margo, who is the heroine of the tale, after all, needed some kind of reward. The way he extricated himself was by letting Eve win the role and applause and award she aimed for, but a) showing there was a new Eve waiting for her as well, and b) giving George Sanders' character the opportunity to blackmail her into a relationship, in a scene that contains about the only clunker of a line the script has, in which he, a professed cynic, suddenly tells her that it's amazing he should want such a depraved woman as herself at all. IMO, a) would have been enough; b) is overdoing it, and isn't very believable. As for Margo: I'm not sure whether or not the film implies that she retires after winning the sexual prize, Bill, and that's my problem. Because she has that line where she says in order to feel like a real woman, you need your man waking up next to you. I know, I know, film of its time, but still. Margo otherwise is shown as being the consumate actress, living for her work; now if we're meant to think that her arc was realizing she can't play the young maidens anymore and moving on to other roles (while also feeling more secure in her relationship with Bill, who is eight years younger than herself - and btw, this must be one of the few Hollywood films where the leading lady has a relationship with a younger man which ends happily), great, but if we're meant to believe she retires from the stage altogether after Bill returned to her and proposed, grrrr, argh. I cling to Sanders' character's pronouncement that Margo will always be a star.
Still, this is one classic where I wish we would get a modern remake. Which would end like Chicago does, with Margo and Eve on stage together, using their rivalry and mutual talent to further both their careers.
Praise first: given that one of the issues of this film, who only doesn't belong in the "Hollywood on Hollywood" category because the action takes place in the theatre world, is the way actresses are forced to stick with the juvenile lead role if they want to get work at all, it's good to see Mankiewicz puts his money where his mouth is, because this is one women-centric picture, with the plum role going to Bette Davis as Margo Channing, who gets to say in on screen dialogue she's 40, the most important supporting role going to Celeste Holms who is Margo's contemporary and thus also in the 40-something category (and the script doesn't pretend otherwise). I have no idea how old Anne Baxter, who playes Eve, the title character and main antagonist, was when she shot this, but she's supposed to be in her early 20s and looks around 30, which is okay. In a nice irony, the one genuine young, really young actress is one Marilyn Monroe, appearing in what is little more than a cameo but nonetheless an oddly touching scene. The menfolk are there to support, be argued over or manipulated by, with one exception, but they're not nearly as important, and it's significant that the one exception is played by the reliably sinister gangster film pro, George Sanders. One one level, the whole film is a biting satire on the "a star is born" cliché and sentimentality, because Eve, who follows that audience familiar route of naive adoring young thing making contact with established star, rising while established star declines and finding humility and talent rewarded by becoming star herself, using her award acceptance speech to thank past star, is really a cool ruthless manipulator who orchestrated the entire rise. Her lovable humble young ingenue persona is a careful construction, based on a realistic estimation of what men (and women) will respond to. She really is a fantastic actress.
Margo, the role Bette Davis won the Oscar for, is something of a contruction herself, and she knows it; but her diva persona has become so much part of her that she has trouble to decide whether there is anything else left. Which leads me to where my one, and major problem with the film is. I think Mankiewicsz was in a bit of a tight spot, given the production code of the time. He couldn't let Eve get away with it unpunished, though the logic of the story demanded that she should; on the other end, Margo, who is the heroine of the tale, after all, needed some kind of reward. The way he extricated himself was by letting Eve win the role and applause and award she aimed for, but a) showing there was a new Eve waiting for her as well, and b) giving George Sanders' character the opportunity to blackmail her into a relationship, in a scene that contains about the only clunker of a line the script has, in which he, a professed cynic, suddenly tells her that it's amazing he should want such a depraved woman as herself at all. IMO, a) would have been enough; b) is overdoing it, and isn't very believable. As for Margo: I'm not sure whether or not the film implies that she retires after winning the sexual prize, Bill, and that's my problem. Because she has that line where she says in order to feel like a real woman, you need your man waking up next to you. I know, I know, film of its time, but still. Margo otherwise is shown as being the consumate actress, living for her work; now if we're meant to think that her arc was realizing she can't play the young maidens anymore and moving on to other roles (while also feeling more secure in her relationship with Bill, who is eight years younger than herself - and btw, this must be one of the few Hollywood films where the leading lady has a relationship with a younger man which ends happily), great, but if we're meant to believe she retires from the stage altogether after Bill returned to her and proposed, grrrr, argh. I cling to Sanders' character's pronouncement that Margo will always be a star.
Still, this is one classic where I wish we would get a modern remake. Which would end like Chicago does, with Margo and Eve on stage together, using their rivalry and mutual talent to further both their careers.
