Mommie Dearest (1981) * *

Directed by:  Frank Perry

Starring:  Faye Dunaway, Diana Scarwid, Steve Forrest, Mara Hobel

Watching Feud, the FX series documenting the famous feud between Jessica Lange and Bette Davis, we get more of a sense of the real Joan Crawford.  What drove her?  What did she fear the most?   The series provided us insight, even as we felt bashed over the head with it after Episode 3.   Mommie Dearest concentrates on the strained, abusive relationship between Joan Crawford and her oldest adopted daughter Christina.   Christina, miffed that her mother did not leave her anything in the will, exacted revenge by writing a scathing tell-all which painted her mother as a verbally and physically abusive monster.   The movie takes this same approach, but what we are watching is mainly a documentation of years-long abuse.   The film looks great and its performances are spot-on, but the production values are wasted on this subject.    

Crawford (Dunaway) is a movie star whose career was starting to fall on hard times when she decides to adopt Christina (Hobel).   The adoption was part publicity stunt and part desire to be a mother.   She would adopt three more, although the movie barely mentions the second child Christopher and doesn't acknowledge the other two at all.   I read the two younger children refuted the accounts professed by Christina and Christopher.  It might have been interesting to see things from their point of view, but Mommie Dearest isn't interested in being balanced.  '

From the looks of this movie, Crawford was a manic-depressive alcoholic who could flip the switch from kindly mother to mother from hell in an instant.   It takes very little to set her off, including using the infamous wire hangers in her closet which she beats Christina with.   ("NO WIRE HANGERS!!")    This is very sad and uncomfortable to watch.   Some may find it entertaining in a sensational way.    Mommie Dearest isn't boring, but it is one-dimensional.  It's just interested in being a scorched-earth view of its subject. 

The movie only shows the events from Christina's point of view.  As a child and as an adult, played by Diana Scarwid, Christina is mostly a victim who occasionally provokes her mother into rage by misbehavior and defiance.   Christina has to hit back somehow and this is her way to do it.  There are moments of truce between the two, but then things flare up again at the slightest argument or misunderstanding.   

Feud mostly avoided Joan's relationship with her children.    In fact, they are rarely seen at all in the eight-part series.   The series and the movie, however, reach the same conclusion, which is Joan Crawford wasn't a lot of fun to be around.