Best Davis Role`
Does anybody else think that this rates up with Davis's best performances?
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MovieChat Forums > Dangerous (1935) Discussion > Best Davis Role`
Yes, I agree it is one of Bette's Best . It's one of her earliest best performances.
shareI don't know if it was her best role, but it was the role she looked best in. Those "Betty Davis eyes" were incredible in this film, her acting spot on. You could see her seducing the architect, not with tricks, but with what was underneath the outer layer of ugliness from the first part of the movie. I was never much of a Davis fan, but I'll have to rethink that after seeing this gem, will be sure and catch her early work every oportunity I can.
shareJust goes to back up what I always say about Davis - she many not have possessed the physical beauty of some other actresses, but she sure could act beautiful, and her films are better-regarded and more frequently revived than those of the beauty queens.
"I don't use a pen: I write with a goose quill dipped in venom!"---W. Lydecker
I like Bette Davis, but I didn't care much for her performance in this. I thought she overplayed it. Didn't she just get done with this character in Of Human Bondage? This film reminded me of a combo of the hit-rock-bottom-girl-that's-still-cocky in Of Human Bondage and the I've-been-through-hell actress in All About Eve- but both of those films I felt were MUCH better than this one. She definately deserved an Oscar for both of those films. Much more, I feel, than she did for this one. Go figure.
"All you need to start an Asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people"-(My Man Godfrey)
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I'd heard the story about how the "write-in" campaign was started and how outraged the Hollywood community was that Davis hadn't been nominated, but the stories seemed to imply that although the "write-in" thing was unique, Davis really never stood a chance of actually winning. Then I watched a show about Claudette Colbert and they mentioned that Colbet had made plans to go back to New York for something and was so convinced that Davis had the Best Actress Award in the bag that she decided to leave the night of the Academy Awards. The Awards people found out about it at the last minute and had to rush to the train station, grab Colbert and get her back to the Awards ceremony just barely in time to accept the Oscar. After all this drama, Davis could have starred in just about ANYTHING the next year and she would have received the Best Actress Award.
Having said that, I think Dangerous is a very interesting movie and that Davis did a great job. Her shrewish bits are a rehash of "Of Human Bondage" but this was the first shot of her doing her "redeemed" woman at the end.
"That sort of thing happens all the time in the history of the Academy Awards!"
Yes.
Jimmy Stewart wins for "The Philadelphia Story", after losing for "Mr Smith Goes to Washington".
Elizabeth Taylor wins for "Butterfield 8" after losing for "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" and "Suddenly, Last Summer". A near-fatal case of pneumonia won her the Oscar.
It seems that voter's remorse is standard fare in Hollywood.
its strange because some people consider this her makeup oscar after not winning for "of human bondage". personally i think this was one of her best nominated performance, though "whatever happened to baby jane" and "all about eve" are better in my opinion.
in regards to her being 'snubbed' for an oscar the year before, "of human bondage" is my least favorite of all her nominated performance, and even some that were not nominated. it was great for a breakthrough, but not nearly as good as people say it was. her accent was simply atrocious. normally i give props for trying with things like that, but with that film i kind of wish she hadn't tried at all.
"they should give nicole kidman an oscar for being able to show any emotion after THAT much botox".
Now Voyager, The Letter, Dark Victory, The Little Foxes, All About Eve, Of Human Bondage and Jezebel are by far better than this in my opinion. I have to agree with Ms. Davis herself, that Kate Hepburn deserved the oscar for Alice Adams this year. Bette deserved it for of human bondage and all about eve. I would say she deserved to win for now voyager too, but her and Greer Garson were both flawless that year.
shareOf course, the issue isn't which of Bette Davis' performances are better than "Of Human Bondage"; it's how her performance in THAT movie THAT year compared to other actress' work. And her work in that movie was ground-breaking in that it was the first time that a major performance in a movie involved that level of realism, ugliness and complete honesty.
It's interesting watching some of Bette's early performance because there is this REAL person in a motion picture with a bunch of actors ACTING like actors, i.e., completely artificially. The best example of that is "The Cabin In The Cotton", where Bette plays a self-indulgent and somewhat cruel young beauty and is COMPLETELY natural in the part, while there are all these "thespians" around her, trying to make a simple story look like Shakespeare. Bette is not only at her absolute height of beauty in the role, she is the ONLY character in the entire movie that you care about.
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yup
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