Joan Crawford in a Strait-Jacket

Before the credits even roll in Strait-Jacket (1964), a narrated flashback provides all the background information we need to know. It starts with Frank Harbin hooking up with ex-girlfriend Stella while his wife Lucy is out of town. Frank takes Stella back to the farm for some hanky-panky, even though his daughter Carol is there (and not asleep). Lucy returns early, of course, and peeks through a window to see Frank and Stella asleep in bed. So, she picks up the ax planted in a nearby stump, enters the house, and slaughters the couple while daughter Lucy looks on.

Twenty years later, an adult Carol (Diane Baker) greets her mother Lucy (Joan Crawford), who has been released from an asylum. Carol, a sculptor, lives with her aunt and uncle who have raised her. She is "almost engaged" to nice guy Michael. She realizes her mother faces a difficult transition to "normal" life. As Lucy peers into the chicken coop, she remarks: "I hate to see anything caged."

Still, things seems to be working out except for the two severed heads Lucy claims appeared in her bed. Lucy also hears a nursery rhyme in which her name has replaced Lizzie Borden's. And did I mention two new ax murders....

Joan Crawford as Lucy.

Written by Robert Bloch, who penned the novel Psycho, Strait-Jacket is one of the many B-suspense films produced in the 1960s--mostly by William Castle or Hammer Pictures. This one is a Castle production and, while it pales next to his classic Homicidal (1961), it provides a juicy role for Joan Crawford. She is quite effective as the unbalanced Lucy, who shifts from withdrawn former patient to protective parent to confident, flamboyant woman (who awkwardly comes on to Michael in front of Carol).

One suspects that Crawford was surprised when bigger roles didn't come her way after What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? scored big at the boxoffice. She began filming Hush...Hush Sweet Charlotte, but was replaced with Olivia de Havilland (read this Vanity Fair article for more details). She subsequently signed with William Castle to do two pictures: Strait-Jacket and I Saw What You Did (1965).

William Castle is probably best-known as a prolific B-movie producer and for introducing gimmicks such as the life insurance policy given to viewers of the "frightening" Macabre. However, he was also an above-average director, as evidenced by Strait-Jacket. His scene transition from sculptor knife to carving knife shows some Hitchcockian style. The dark slaughterhouse, where two victims meet their ends, provides a stark contrast to the brightly-lit farm. An unhinged Lucy casually striking a match on a record on the turntable is a brilliant touch (it has been clipped for YouTube...more than once).

Diane Baker as Carol.

Naturally, Strait-Jacket features a twist ending, though I doubt if it will surprise many viewers. I must say, though, that it leads to a great scene for one cast member.

Incidentally, Joan Crawford and Diane Baker also played mother and daughter in the same year's Della. They were also guest stars (separately) in back-to-back episodes in the fourth season of Route 66. In Joan's episode, "Same Picture, Different Frame," her character was stalked by a homicidal ex-husband just released from an asylum!

That's a Good Boy, Trog!

Trog watches children at a playground.

Joan Crawford probably didn't envision her film career ending with a notoriously bad, low-budget drive-in picture about the Missing Link. Yet, Trog (1970) was the cinematic swan song for the actress that graced the silver screen in classics like Mildred Pierce and Johnny Guitar. It was, incidentally, the only Joan Crawford movie I saw theatrically; it was the second half of a double-feature with Hammer's Taste the Blood of Dracula.

To be fair, Trog isn't as dreadful as many critics would have you believe. If you want to watch a truly awful film about a caveman coping with modern civilization, then I recommend you check out Eegah! (1962). With a (much) better script, Trog could have been an interesting ethical drama about whether the caveman should be treated as a scientific specimen or a human being. (By the way, that premise was explored in Fred Schepisi's 1984 film Iceman and, to a lesser degree, in a 1970 Burt Reynolds movie called Skullduggery.)

Joan Crawford as Dr. Brockton.

Trog opens with three spelunkers discovering a caveman in a cavern near the Salton Marshes. The troglodyte--dubbed Trog for short--kills one of the youths and leaves another wounded and in shock. The third young man, Malcolm, goes to work for anthropologist Dr. Brockton (Crawford) who wants to study Trog. She captures the caveman and keeps him chained and in a cage in her facility.

Brockton and her daughter Anne teach Trog how to imitate human actions such as winding up a walking doll. They even train him to retrieve a ball, which sadly leads to the worst dialogue Joan Crawford ever uttered in a movie: "That's a good boy, Trog!"

Not everyone supports Dr. Brockton's experiments. A local entrepreneur (Michael Gough) wants to build a housing project and argues that having a murderous caveman in the community is bad for business. There's also an incident in which Trog kills a neighbor's dog while playing fetch with Dr. Brockton. (This scene really bothered me...I mean, Dr. Brockton was playing with Trog in an open meadow where anyone could happen along?)

As one might expect, Trog eventually gets free--but he doesn't go on much of a rampage. Sure, he kills a couple of villagers in fear and kidnaps a little girl that looked like the doll. It makes for a pretty low-key climax and reinforces the fact that, contrary to popular opinion, Trog is not a horror movie at all.

Michael Gough as the "villain."

Neither Joan Crawford nor Michael Gough can do much with their cliched roles. Still, I think Joan might have been more effective if she had played Brockton with more restraint.

One of the more ridiculous scenes in Trog has the caveman "remembering" the days of the dinosaurs as the result of an experiment. (Never mind that humans and dinosaurs existed a few million years apart!) The good news is that the dinosaur scenes were lifted from the 1956 Irwin Allen documentary The Animal World and were animated by Willis O'Brien and Ray Harryhausen.

Trog producer Herman Cohen also worked with Joan Crawford on the earlier (and better) psychological thriller Berserk (1967). Also, though it was paired with a Christopher Lee Dracula film in the U.S., Trog is not a Hammer film. However, two notable Hammer alumni worked on it: Freddie Francis (Dracula Has Risen from the Grave) was the director and John Gilling (The Plague of the Zombies) co-wrote the original story.

Here's a clip from Trog courtesy of Warner Archive and available on the Cafe's YouTube channel.

Joan Crawford Triple-feature: Johnny Guitar, Mildred Pierce, and The Women

Johnny Guitar (1954)
Director: Nicholas Ray

Cast: Joan Crawford, Sterling Hayden, Mercedes McCambridge, and Scott Brady.

This one-of-a-kind Western is dominated by two strong-willed, pistol-packing women: Crawford as a cynical saloon owner and McCambridge as a sexually-repressed cattle owner. The plot has been frequently described as an indictment of McCarthyism, with McCambridge inciting a “witch hunt” against Crawford’s progressively-minded businesswoman. However, the film’s classic status can be attributed to its rich characters, the over-the-top (but effective) performances, and Philip Yordan’s crackling, contemporary dialogue (one of Joan’s employees comments about his boss: “I’ve never seen a woman who was more a man. She thinks like one, acts like one, and sometimes makes me feel that I’m not.”). With the exception of Crawford’s lovers (Hayden and Brady), the males are portrayed as weak and ineffectual: when it’s time to lynch Crawford, the men of the posse turn to McCambridge to play hangmen; Brady’s gang is indecisive and weak, consisting of a sick man, a hothead, and a wet-behind-the-ears punk. It’s fitting that the climatic confrontation is between the women. Watch for Hayden’s speech on the virtues of “a good smoke and a cup of coffee.” This picture and Fritz Lang’s Rancho Notorious, which stars Marlene Dietrich as an outlaw leader, would make a fine double-feature.

Mildred Pierce (1945)

Director: Michael Curtiz

Cast: Joan Crawford, Ann Blyth, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, and Eve Arden.

Joan Crawford won an Oscar in the title role as a mother-turned-entrepreneur who dotes on her older daughter, ignores her younger one, and has little use for the men in her life. Unfortunately, older daughter Veda (Blyth) is thankless, materialistic, and focused only on herself—and blames her mother for everything (“It‘s your fault I’m the way I am!”). The film’s enduring popularity can be attributed to the fact that it works on several levels. It’s a first-rate soap-opera with strong female characters that dominate the film (in addition to Mildred and Veda, Eva Arden has a field day as Mildred’s wisecracking friend Ida). It’s part murder mystery; the film opens with Zachary Scott’s good-for-nothing playboy being shot four times in a shadow-filled beach house.  And, best of all, it features some psychological undercurrents worthy of in-depth discussion (e.g., what was the true motivation behind Mildred’s second marriage and what did she think was going to happen?). Crawford gives one of her most finely nuanced performances and gets strong supports from the rest of the cast. Carson, in a change-of-pace from his usual comedic roles, delivers the goods as a would-be wolf always interested in a quick buck.  Although Mildred Pierce earned six Oscar nominations, the highly versatile Curtiz was ignored.

Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, and
Rosalind Russell.

The Women (1939) 

Director: George Cukor

Cast: Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Joan Fontaine, Paulette Goddard, and Mary Boland.

Who needs men? Not this quintessential women’s picture about female friendships, feuds, and fashions among New York’s upper class. Based on Claire Booth Luce’s Broadway play, The Women features an all-female cast and a screenplay adapted by Anita Loos and Jane Murfin. George Cukor, who was sometimes labeled a “women’s director”, made the only significant male contribution. (It’s important to note that Hollywood did not embrace female directors until a decade later when pioneers like Ida Lupino entered the ranks.) Norma Shearer headlines The Women as Mary Haines, whose seemingly ideal marriage takes a hit when she learns of her husband’s affair with ambitious sales clerk Joan Crawford. Mary’s mother tells her to forget her husband’s indiscretion if Mary still loves him. But others advise her that a Reno divorce is the proper response. While many individual scenes ring true emotionally (especially the ones between Mary and her young daughter), The Women simmers dramatically without reaching a full boil. Part of the blame can be attributed to the large cast and subplots that bloat the story. For example, during the first half-hour, it’s a chore just to learn all the characters and how they’re related. The success of the ending also depends on one’s perception of a character that’s never seen nor heard—Mary’s husband. I didn’t like the guy and, as a result, I didn’t care for the film’s resolution. Still, The Women is an ambitious, unique movie that was embraced by both critics and the public when originally released. In contrast, a 2008 remake starring Meg Ryan and Annette Bening, was universally panned by critics and ignored by moviegoers. 

"Possessed: The Life of Joan Crawford" by Donald Spoto

Faye Dunaway as Crawford.

If you know who Joan Crawford is, then surely the image you conjure up when you think of her is that of the grotesque Mommie Dearest as portrayed in the book by her adopted daughter, Christina Crawford, and in the subsequent horrific movie starring Faye Dunaway. In his latest biography Possessed: The Life of Joan Crawford (William Morrow, 352 pages), author Donald Spoto presents the many sides of Joan Crawford--the good the bad and the ugly. The result is a portrait of a woman plagued by inner demons that seemed to haunt her through her entire life, although she made a Herculean effort to banish them forever.

Spoto is not an apologist for Joan Crawford's tarnished image, nor does he try to revise history. He presents the facts as they happened and comments on their validity and impact upon Joan, her private life and on-screen persona. He made full use of the vast amount of information available electronically, filling the pages with direct quotes from many of the people who were instrumental in creating Joan Crawford, the star: her ex-husbands, lovers, writers, directors, and studio moguls. This was a complex woman, and if you want to look beyond "no more wire hangers," this is a good place to start.

The driving force in Joan Crawford's life--the fire in her belly, the impetus for everything she ever did--was her devastatingly unhappy childhood, and her efforts to erase all vestiges of the impoverished and love-deprived Lucille Le Sueur. Each chapter in the book represents a specific timeframe in Joan's life, chronicling her interactions with the people and events that contributed to her intensely personalized master plan for success. The seedlings are planted in her unstable childhood, never knowing her real father and going through a series of stepfathers, who eventually walked out of her life, reinforcing her sense of abandonment and initiating an ultimately frustrating search for someone to love her. She was forced to leave school in the fifth grade and join her mother providing for the family. She worked wherever her mother managed to find employment, mostly in laundries where the family lived on site in what could be described as little more than a hovel. The years spent working as a laundress, with its inherent drudgery and monotony, provided fodder for her ever increasing inferiority complex. Her bother, Hal, an early 20th century version of a slacker, was her mother's favorite, and was never asked to contribute to the family upkeep.

Crawford and Franchot Tone.

Joan's lack of education also preyed on her ego and contributed to the feelings of low esteem that she would eventually obsessively attempt to conquer. Uneducated and unrefined, she realized that she had to learn how to present herself physically and mentally in order to survive in the Darwinian social structure that existed in Hollywood. She readily acknowledges that her marriages to Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and Franchot Tone provided her with a veritable masters degree in self-improvement. Both men introduced her to literature, the arts, politics, and she gleaned enough information to comfortably engage in conversations with the more sophisticated members of her husbands' circle of friends and the Hollywood elite.

Joan with Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.

Joan had many teachers who provided the lessons she needed in order to perfect her image. The gesturing and wide-eyed expressions of the silent films had to be replaced with more subtle and nuanced use of the face to convey a characters emotional reactions. Crewmembers shared important aspects of lighting and camera placement, which provided her with a working knowledge of behind the scenes filmmaking. Costume designers and makeup artists helped her during the various phases of her career, creating the right look for the flapper, shopgirl, independent woman, and sophisticate. The right look, in public, at the studio and at home, was fanatically maintained. From hair to shoes, Joan could never appear as the girl next door in jeans and a blouse. She was a star, and fans expected nothing less than the image they saw on the silver screen.

Joan wished very much to have children, and give them all the love and advantages of a good home. This quest proved disastrous and often legally questionable, as in desperation, she turned to so-called "baby brokers." Despite a resolve to prevent the children from experiencing the pain and loss of her own childhood, she could not overcome the demand for perfection nor could she provide the children with the stability of a father figure. As testament to her failed attempts to create a happy household, each child harbored totally disparate memories and images of Joan as a mother.

Alfred Steele.

Joan's own pursuit of love, resulted in numerous long and short-term affairs; even while married, she continued her quest for the seemingly unattainable, but still felt devastatingly lonely. When Alfred Steele, the charismatic president of Pepsi-Cola entered her life, she knew she would marry him and felt confident that he would bestow her with the love she so achingly craved and banish the spectre of loneliness from her life. After Steele's untimely death in 1959, age 58, Joan maintained that during her four years of marriage she felt fulfilled and truly alive for the first time in her life.

The ferocity of determination, which had transformed a little waif from Texas into one of the most glamorous denizens of Hollywood also applied to her career path, effecting the choices she made regarding roles she was offered and roles she wanted to play. She transitioned easily from silent films to talking pictures. She'd been one of MGM's brightest stars and continued to be so with the introduction of sound. However, she became frustrated with the roles she was assigned, the quality of the scripts and directors who did not share her ambitions regarding stardom. Her acting style and appearance were constantly evolving in an effort to achieve perfection of the image that she fervently believed was still a work in progress. Spoto presents an interesting timeline of films along with revealing insights into Joan's choices, and her feelings about the completed film. He devotes almost a chapter to a wrongheaded decision by Joan to star in a film called Torch Song, considered one of the worst movies ever made and one of the most unintentionally hilarious. Contrary to world opinion, Joan loved it, and even bemoaned the fact that they didn't make pictures like this anymore.

There is also a document presented in the book, originally published in Life Magazine in February 1964, detailing the require-ments Joan demanded at all hotels she stayed at during a publicity tour for the film Strait-Jacket. Its excesses are reflective of Joan Crawford's self-image, that of a great motion picture star representative of all the glamour and sophistication associated with Hollywood and therefore entitled to all the creature comforts available at whatever cost.

If you're a long-standing Joan Crawfor fan, you are probably familiar with much of the information presented in this book. Fledgling admirers, however, will find this a veritable treasure trove of the events and people who helped power Joan Crawford's juggernaut to her rightful place as a Hollywood legend.

HarperCollins Publishers provided a review copy of Possessed to the Classic Film & TV Cafe.

31 Days of Halloween: Grande Dames take on Grand Guignol in "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?"

Sibling rivalry gone amok is at the heart of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (black & white, 1962). The film opens early in the 20th century, when vaudeville was still in vogue. Baby Jane Hudson, a spoiled, demanding and apparently none-too-gifted child star is the apple of her cloying father's eye. Her older, envious sister Blanche tends to smolder in the wings as Jane garners the shrieks and applause of her fans...but times change. Cut to a dark night and a fateful "accident" many years later...cut again to the early 60's, when former child star Jane (Bette Davis) and former movie star Blanche (Joan Crawford) now share a decomposing mansion...and some ugly memories. Blanche is crippled and wheelchair-bound as a result of the earlier "accident," and Jane is equally crippled, though her malady is psychological and fueled by alcohol.

Director Robert Aldrich (Kiss Me Deadly, The Dirty Dozen) spins a beautifully twisted tale, adapted by Lukas Heller from Henry Farrell's novel, and creates a suspense-driven, enduring classic filled with macabre and gruesome set pieces and memorable moments. Bette Davis inhabits the title role of the aged, demented "Baby Jane." Inappropriate in every way, Jane flounces around the house and neighborhood in vintage wig, makeup and clothing that recall the era when she was a young star. Joan Crawford portrays the long-suffering Blanche who managed to achieve stardom on her own but harbors a secret and is now completely dependent upon her increasingly disturbed sister. When Jane discovers that Blanche has plans to sell the mansion and put her in a home, the situation turns deadly and the suspense takes off. It doesn't let up. And, in the tradition of some of the best of the genre, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? delivers a plot twist, though a poignant one, at the end.

A sleeper that became a sensation when it was released, the film sparked a trend in casting one-time Hollywood leading ladies in horror/thriller melodramas. However, none of those that followed were on a par with Baby Jane: Crawford in Strait-Jacket, Berserk, etc.; Davis in Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte, Dead Ringer, etc.; Olivia de Havilland in Lady in a Cage (and Charlotte with Davis and Joseph Cotten)...and even Joan Bennett in the gothic TV phenomenon, "Dark Shadows." But the film did more than make money (it was the first Hollywood film to earn back its budget in one weekend) and set a trend, it was also nominated for five Academy Awards and won for best B&W costume design.

This film is celebrated for many reasons, but it is the performance of Bette Davis that cements Baby Jane's place as a classic outside any genre. Davis "kicks out the jams" and gives a bravura portrayal, one of fascinating depth. Her Baby Jane Hudson is a grotesque, yes, she's over-the-top and she is terrifying at times...but she also has comic elements...and she is also a tragic, even touching figure. Crawford deserves attention, too, for bravely going toe-to-toe with Davis and turning in one of her most interesting performances, and Victor Buono is also notable for his magnificently repellent rendition of the corpulent accompanist Jane hires when she decides to return to show business.

This is one film that was literally meant to be seen on Halloween - it was released on October 31, 1962...