This 1955 camp-fest may require a love for Joan Crawford that few folks can muster — Queen Bee, directed by Randall McDougall, is for those who stick with Joan through thick and thin, fans who love Possessed and Mildred Pierce, but are also enraptured by Flamingo Road, Autumn Leaves, and The Caretakers, pictures that showcased an older, severe woman who in the latter film, instructs her nurses in Judo. (Obviously, I love The Caretakers).
In Queen Bee, Crawford plays Eva Phillips, a deceptively personable woman who lords over a Southern mansion with her husband Avery (Barry Sullivan), whom everyone calls "beauty" for the large scar on his face. Those close to Eva know she's utterly evil and corrupt, but young Jennifer Stewart (Lucy Marlow), a cousin who comes to live in the manor, is not so sure — at first. As the picture makes quite clear (from a character's speech about bees, to another character actually reading a book about bees...bees...bees...so many bees), Eva is, yep, the Queen Bee and those buzzing around are her drones. She will sting anyone who crosses or interrupts her ambitions to get what she wants — which is, apparently, everything. World domination would not be surprising.
Eventually Jennifer (the one who looked up the bee book) witnesses Eva's machinations, including the destruction of sister-in-law Carol's upcoming nuptials to Judson Prentiss (Betsy Palmer and the great John Ireland). Judson, for reasons we can only believe to be pure sexual masochism on the level of Harvey Korman and Nurse Diesel, has been Eva's lover, while Eva has tortured her understandably ill-tempered, drunkard husband.
Some terrific arguments, tragedies, notable acting by Crawford and Ireland, and sheer menopausal meltdowns occur, keeping the viewer oddly riveted. I was oddly riveted. Queen Bee was released to some poor reviews; Bosley Crowther of The New York Times called it the "height of mellifluous meanness and frank insincerity." He's right and wrong. Yes, the cruelty is often dished out with sugar (not a bad thing either), but there is something sincere about Queen Bee, chiefly that the actors sincerely appear to be afraid of Ms. Crawford, and that Joan sincerely looks like she understands her character, with lines like the following (which Eva drops on her husband): "Darling, parties are to women what battlefields are to men, but then... you weren't in the war were you? Something about drinking...." And when packing up a room mounts from simply throwing dolls onto the floor to a psychotic crescendo of Joan trashing the place with a riding crop, Crawford doesn't seem to be acting. No wonder young Christina reportedly ran from the theater while enduring this scene.
And though I do love the young, ravishing Joan (see George Cukor's underappreciated A Woman's Face), watching those thick, painted eyebrows, hunter's-bow mouth, and huge shoulders saunter across a room ready to explode in a rage of bizarre evil is like anticipating Jason creeping around the summer camp in Friday the 13th. No wonder one of Queen Bee's actresses, Betsy Palmer, went on to play Jason's mother in that franchise — she obviously had proper training.
There are certain things in this Universe that are just so perfect - such amazing representations of what they are - that I'm convinced that they were destined to exist. Usually, it's a song or a book that are so perfect, it seems someone HAD to write it. Occasionally, a film will fall into this category. In this case, I think Joan Crawford does. In this film (and others), her performance is pitched exactly as it should be, and nobody else would've done it "right." That Joan was a pip, eh?
Posted by: Theron | October 23, 2006 at 01:35 PM