Review of Hush... Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) by Jenessa H — 30 Jan 2007

This is a really, really ridiculous movie. The trailers are singularly unhelpful--and the only reason I don't hate the theme song more than any I've ever heard is that I've also seen [i]High Noon[/i].

Anyway.

When I was a student at Evergreen, I was in a program called South, which was, oddly enough, about the American South. The year I took it, there was an article in Harper's about Southern literature called, if I remember properly, "Is There a Dead Mule In It?" The article hypothesized that you could tell it was Southern literature if there was a dead mule in it. (Oddly enough.).

When we later watched [i]Night of the Hunter[/i], we realized there wasn't a dead mule to be seen. Therefore, we came up with the "Crazy Old Man Corollary to the Dead Mule Hypothesis": if there isn't a dead mule, check for the crazy old man. In this case, we have a crazy old woman instead. In fact, we have a whole bunch of 'em. (Okay, Gwen points out that there was indeed a crazy old man--in fact, a crazy old coroner! But still. Lots and lots of crazy old women.).

This is not a good movie. It's a very bad movie, in fact, but it does have one heck of a cast. Including poor Bruce Dern getting killed in flashback again. Why Bruce Dern? Is he really so evil that both Marnie and the murderer here need him dead? In fact, here, he actually gets his head and a hand (just the one, apparently) cut off. Which is really quite dead--though the stump of his wrist was, in fact, really quite fake. Ah, 1964.

How old was Miriam when the murder takes place? Olivia de Havilland would have been about twelve. Bette Davis would've been about 19, which is about right. Still, Olivia de Havilland looks [i]way[/i] younger. (So does Bruce Dern. But then, he is.).

This is a Southern melodrama of the most glorious type. It was originally supposed to costar Joan Crawford, but she "got sick." Half of Hollywood then apparently refused to be in it, until they finally managed to twist the arm of Bette Davis's close personal friend Olivia de Havilland. (The fact that they were, in fact, friends, and her arm still had to be twisted, should tell you something.) The house is now restored, and tours are now available. It's still not incentive enough for me to go into rural Louisiana.

Which, note to the film makers, doesn't actually have counties. It has parishes.