MovieChat Forums > All This, and Heaven Too (1940) Discussion > was Bette Davis ever more beautiful...

was Bette Davis ever more beautiful...

posted 13 years ago by PussyCrusher_Principal
15 replies | jump to latest

...than in this film? It may be, at least partially, because she plays a softer character than in most of the movies I've seen her in thus far (Of Human Bondage, The Letter, All About Eve, among others), but I've never seen those big beautiful eyes look so inviting and pleasant. Certainly, the hairstyles here complement her features moreso than the ones in other films. Not that she's ever been unattractive to me, just that she's more conventionally beautiful in 'All This And Heaven Too'. Maybe, and I say this half-jokingly, her other characters just scare the conventional male in me (like they're meant to). Not that those "scary" women she played are a negative thing; on the contrary...I haven't seen anything yet that I haven't liked her in. After all, those other roles are more her stock-in-trade than Mademoiselle Deluzy-Desportes; and not that the Mademoiselle is a doormat herself. She's just not the ruthless character it seems B.D. could have played in her sleep. And if her eyes are not necessarily unpleasant or uninviting elsewhere, it usually seems you're being invited to your doom...like a Venus Flytrap. Not that there's anything wrong with that...she's always amazing and, as evidenced in 'All This...', she had incredible range. I guess my point is, if anyone ever doubts how very beautiful Bette Davis was (and those people are out there), this is the first place to which I'd direct them.

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[–] OmarLove 12 years ago

I think she was at her most beautiful in Jezebel. Partly due to how big-eyed
and lovely she was at that age, and helped by beautiful costuming.

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[–] poetcomic1 12 years ago

The very end of Jezebel, in profile, with the flames burning behind her as she rides off with the dying Henry Fonda... NEVER did she look more beautiful!

[–] jacowium 12 years ago

I totally agree with everything you said here, and I think your Venus Flytrap comparison sums it up very neatly. As a male myself, I am sure that I'd have melted in the presence of Bette Davis (especially in the way she looked up to the mid-1940's), and it wouldn't have mattered to me whether she was angelic or a witch. There's just something about her posture and her delicate expressions (sometimes cruel, sometimes kind) that might have robbed me of my free will and turned her wishes into my commands... jeez, just look at the way I'm blabbering already!

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[–] mark-1589 11 years ago

Certainly Bette was very beautiful in this film, but as to the question, personally I'll take her in Dark Victory or Now Voyager.

[–] angelexposed 11 years ago

I didn't really find her exceptionally beautiful, rather plain to me, but that's just my opinion. My mother always states though that she was at her most beautiful in Now Voyager (especially in 'the' dress).

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We've become a race of peeping toms.

[–] TrangPak2 11 years ago

I think That Certain woman and Dark Victory contain her most beautiful appearances.

[–] Earl-Janoth 11 years ago

I thought she looked awful. There were a number of different hairstyles during the period that would have looked better on her than the one they chose. Her eyes looked sunken, her mouth sour and that hair...just awful. I think she looked much better in Dark Victory the previous year.

[–] angelexposed 10 years ago

To be honest I don't think she was supposed to be exceptionally stunning and it was probably deliberate her hair styles, dresses and makeup were unflattering. I think this was the point as it was more her loving personality and spirit that the Duc supposedly fell in love with rather than her beauty.

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We've become a race of peeping toms.

[–] mmitsos-1 10 years ago

She was beautiful in so many of her films...this one, "Now Voyager", "Jezebel", "Sisters", "Deception", "All About Eve", and many others.

[–] dustypork 10 years ago

I am on the "Now Voyager" bandwagon. She looked great in that film, but I find her over-tweezed eyebrows unattractive.

[–] ClassicMovieholic 10 years ago

I think she was attractive in different ways in nearly all of her non-grotesque early 1930s through early 1950s roles I've seen, and quite genuinely beautiful in some. The fact that her appeal came largely from personality rather than conventional looks allowed her to play a number of different types convincingly. Thus she was never cast as just a smoldering Jezebel, just a femme fatale, just a girl next door, just a virtuous goody-goody, just a comic love interest, just an earthy natural beauty...as some actresses of the era were. She played women of multiple social classes, maturity levels, moralities, etc...though she seems to be remembered largely as a formidable, man-eating badass.

She did have a quiet loveliness in All This, and Heaven too which she rarely had opportunities to display.