The Bad Seed - spoilers
A. Nony Moose
This film is essentially a filmed play. The director takes no advantage of the
film medium.
The performances range from overwrought bad acting to wooden bad acting, save
the performances by Henry Jones and perhaps Eileen Heckart.
Apparently the adults in this film suffer from the same delusion Joan Crawford
did in "Mildred Pierce" and are unable to see what a horrible little brat Rhoda
is.
The script is ludicrously bad, made worse by the terrible acting by the leading
actors Nancy Kelly, Evelyn Varden, Paul Fix and William Hopper.
The final deus ex machina scene is destroyed by the narrarator's "wait a moment"
and the introduction of the cast.
It then descends into inanity with Rhoda getting spanked.
Grade: F
Tom Benton
wrote:
Frankly, it had one of the dumbest endings I have ever seen.
_____________________________________
Procrastinate now! Do not put it off!
Ellen DeGeneres
Mark
The production code forced them to change the original ending which
had the mother dying from the gunshot wound and Rhoda living and
smiling like a little devil. Now that was very effective on stage.
Mark
I'm sure you would have preferred to be the one being spanked.
It's not a great movie but an "F?" F must stand for what you wish you
were doing instead of licking your mama's titties.
A. Nony Moose
"Mark" <weiss...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:71e470d7-e4f7-4fa4...@x3g2000yqj.googlegroups.com...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Does your mommy know you're using her computer?
Into the killfile you go, little boy.
PLONK
ralph
get Mitched in “The Night of the Hunter,” you really want to see Patty
McCormack dispatch her in "The Bad Seed." Caught the last hour on TCM
the other day and I had forgotten how annoyingly theatrical Nancy
Kelly is. She has this one scene with Paul Fix during which she goes
off on some tangent perhaps not wholly unrelated to her character’s
realization of the little psycho bitch’s murderous self-indulgence and
though a Broadway moment meant as showstopper (rewarded with a Tony)
the camera absorbs it as over-kill. The same goes for her operator-
assisted call to Washington and Eileen Heckart’s alcoholic breakdown.
The foolish multiple endings didn’t escape the Saturday matinee
teenage audiences, whose laughs turned into howls of derisiveness and
then applause as the lightning strikes.
A. Nony Moose
"ralph" <ralph...@nowreviewing.com> wrote in message
news:e436dfa0-3403-4a1b...@w5g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
>The foolish multiple endings didn’t escape the Saturday matinee
teenage audiences, whose laughs turned into howls of derisiveness and
then applause as the lightning strikes.
Multiple endings indeed!
Ending #1: Rhoda's mother give her an OD then shoots herself.
Ending #2: Rhoda's mother recovers in the hospital.
Ending #3: Rhoda gets zapped by lightning.
Actually using #1 and fading to black would have improved the film tremendously.
Whatever tension, regardless of how weak, that had been built was absolutely
destroyed by the ridiculous "wait a moment", introduction of the cast and
Rhoda's spanking.
This film cries out for a remake, esp. along the lines of the original novel.
moviePig
> "ralph" <ralphben...@nowreviewing.com> wrote in message
Been done, and pretty well. E.g., THE GOOD SON and ORPHAN...
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calvin
the cemetary and getting zapped is accompanied
by some uber-exciting Alex North.
calvin
Wait ... it was a park, not a cemetary.
A.Gerard
child- however evil- was still a child, and should be allowed to live.
He felt killing her off would not be taken seriously by audiences.
There was a TV-Movie remake in 1985 with Blair Brown, which kept the
original ending.
Whatever the acting quality of the rest of the cast, what did you
think of the child actress herself? She has received nothing but
praise for her performance.
A. Nony Moose
"A.Gerard" <ang...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:03a78963-2174-4124...@s2g2000yql.googlegroups.com...
Patty McCormack's performance was at a level one would expect from an elementary
school play - in other words, dreadful.
Janice
.
Apparently Patty McCormack did a convincing job at the time, because
adults believed her. I think this movie (and play) had a lot of
impact in the 50's... I know my mother made reference to it when she
was taking me to task for whatever childish horror I had
perpetrated.
I also think it may have had some influence on the generation gap of
the 60's, when parents were more horrified and terrified by their
"evil" boomer children than was really called for. It's not like
there'd never been a generation in rebellion before... but Kent State
proved that killing them was the preferred ending after all.
~`~
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moviePig
Patty McCormack played a stiff, unctious little faker ...reminiscent
of the lame performances typical from child actors, but also exactly
what this role called for. Whether that's good acting or good
casting, I couldn't say...
Janice
.
> Patty McCormack played a stiff, unctious little faker ...reminiscent
> of the lame performances typical from child actors, but also exactly
> what this role called for. Whether that's good acting or good
> casting, I couldn't say...
Now there's a job that probably doesn't get the credit it deserves. I
can't tell you how many times I've suspected the real artist has been
the casting director.
~`~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
calvin
> I also think it may have had some influence on the generation gap of
> the 60's, when parents were more horrified and terrified by their
> "evil" boomer children than was really called for. It's not like
> there'd never been a generation in rebellion before... but Kent State
> proved that killing them was the preferred ending after all.
Though I was long out of college I was still as stupid
as the Kent State demonstrators and got tear-gassed
for joining in a Univ. of Maryland protest at the same
time (roughly) as the Kent State protest. I believe we
and Kent State were protesting the Cambodia bombing.
Nobody at Maryland was killed, however. I have no
sympathy now for people like I was then, but I'm not for
killing them either.