This is one heck of a disturbing movie. I'm aware that Little Edie is quite a cult figure with a loyal following even years after her death, but I'm not sure how someone like her would generate "fans" per se. If she wasn't mentally ill when she moved back in with her mother, she certainly was by the time the Maylses showed up, and her narcissistic mother is surely the one who punched her ticket to the funny farm.
I understand the Beales were delighted with the film when it was screened for them. Anyone who's okay with being portrayed the way those two women are in this movie is not playing with a full deck, period. One half-naked and screeching "Tea For Two"; the other with her skirt on upside down and an unidentifiable piece of clothing pinned to her head marching to a rah-rah fight song nope, no adult women I know would be happy about ending up on film looking like that. I'm acquainted with some poor housekeepers who don't feel comfortable letting repairmen in the house but they don't have huge holes in their walls that raccoons are coming and going through, and they don't have rooms piled waist-high with empty tin cans. This is a problem, and hardly anything to admire.
Personally, I was torn between a certain degree of pity and outright revulsion, and I found it very hard to finish the film (took me 2 nights; I needed a break). It's sad that the husband/father and sons/brothers retreated, but who could entirely blame them? In those days I doubt there were the safety-nets in place that are available now; maybe the only thing the men of the family could think of to do was step away and go on with their own lives.
To the reviewer who mentioned Miss Havisham: spot on! In living color and stereo!
I'm glad for the sake of the once-beautiful home that someone bought it and restored it.
I understand the Beales were delighted with the film when it was screened for them. Anyone who's okay with being portrayed the way those two women are in this movie is not playing with a full deck, period. One half-naked and screeching "Tea For Two"; the other with her skirt on upside down and an unidentifiable piece of clothing pinned to her head marching to a rah-rah fight song nope, no adult women I know would be happy about ending up on film looking like that. I'm acquainted with some poor housekeepers who don't feel comfortable letting repairmen in the house but they don't have huge holes in their walls that raccoons are coming and going through, and they don't have rooms piled waist-high with empty tin cans. This is a problem, and hardly anything to admire.
Personally, I was torn between a certain degree of pity and outright revulsion, and I found it very hard to finish the film (took me 2 nights; I needed a break). It's sad that the husband/father and sons/brothers retreated, but who could entirely blame them? In those days I doubt there were the safety-nets in place that are available now; maybe the only thing the men of the family could think of to do was step away and go on with their own lives.
To the reviewer who mentioned Miss Havisham: spot on! In living color and stereo!
I'm glad for the sake of the once-beautiful home that someone bought it and restored it.