Mommie Dearest (No Spoilers)

The final day of Razzie Winners Week and Day 7's entry makes all the suffering earlier this week worth it.

Mommie Dearest is an adaptation of Christina Crawford's memoirs about life growing up with her mother, screen legend Joan Crawford. Joan, twice divorced and living alone, decides that after all her career success she wants a child. Not being able to have any, she must adopt, but she is turned down by the agency. Her attorney friend helps her acquire a daughter only a few months old. The film follows the rocky relationship of Joan and daughter Christina from Christina's early childhood through Joan's death.

Redefining melodramatic, Faye Dunaway hams it up in this jilted, one-sided story of the private life of Miss Crawford. Strongly emphasizing an obsessive-compulsive disorder, Faye plays the part of Joan almost like a Saturday Night Live sketch character, but for 2 straight hours, instead of five minutes. And it all explodes in full force in the now iconic, and highly entertaining, "wire hanger" scene.

Of course, Faye's not the only culprit here in over-acting. Mara Hobel, as the child Christina, and Diana Scarwind, as teenage/young adult Christina, both fight tooth and nail for their share of screaming and crying, though nowhere near with the same bravado as Faye. However, both girls certainly manage to hold their own, leaving virtually every scene with mother and daughter attempting to top the melodrama from the previous scene.

Mommie Dearest's over-the-top execution is so bad, it's good. This is what campy cult classics are made of. I'm not really sure why it was disgraced with the Razzie Worst Picture of 1982: I've seen Oscar winning films with just as much melodrama and hamminess, yet people love to praise them. (I shan't name any names.)

Rating:


Random Facts:
-Other Razzie 1982 Worst Picture Nominees were Endless Love, Heaven's Gate, The Legend of the Lone Ranger, and Tarzan. the Ape Man.
-Mommie Dearest won a total of 5 Razzies out of 9 nominations. It also picked up an additional award in 1990 as Worst Picture of the Decade and an additional nomination in 2005 for Worst "Drama" of Our First 25 Years.
-Mommie Dearest currently has an IMDB rating of 6.3 and a 57% on Rotten Tomatoes, making it the highest rated film of the week!

Final Thoughts:
Well, it was not easy getting through this, but I soldiered on. Like I said on Day 1 though: you can't appreciate all the good stuff without watching some crap occasionally. I just hope watching all the garbage of Razzie Winners Week didn't have any lasting negative effects on my baby. Brad would never forgive me.