What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962 movie)

She eerily begins to dance around for them on the sand, as she did when she was a child star, as the nightmare and the beautiful dream mingle. Although not an original idea, the movie's most famous "bit" is having Paul Henried put two cigarettes in his mouth, light both of them and hand one to Bette Davis. Jane obviously thinks they are her adoring public. The title comes from the Walt Whitman poem "The Untold Want", which says: The untold want, by life and land ne'er granted, / Now, Voyager sail thou forth to seek and find.. When she goes and gets two ice cream cones at the small stand, the police approach her and begin asking where her sister is as a crowd gathers. It won the Academy Award for Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture, and was nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Bette Davis) and Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Gladys Cooper). After a silence, Jane says, with a childish smile, "Do you like ice cream?". The screenplay follows the novel very closely, except that in the book the cruise Charlotte takes is a Mediterranean, not a South American, one.

Jane turns to her and says pitifully, "You mean, all this time we could have been friends?". The movie was adapted by Casey Robinson from the 1941 novel by Olive Higgins Prouty. It was directed by Irving Rapper. Blanche tells her the truth of the dark secret she has kept because of her hatred of Jane. It stars Bette Davis, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Gladys Cooper, Bonita Granville, John Loder, Ilka Chase, Lee Patrick, Franklin Pangborn and Mary Wickes. She begins acting like a child and covers her ears. After a brief love affair during a cruise, she determines to help her lover's equally depressed daughter. As the sun comes up, Jane is sitting beside the ill and dying Blanche, who she has wrapped up in hot blankets. Blanche wants to tell her something about the night she was paralyzed, but Jane will not listen. Now, Voyager is a 1942 film which tells the story of a middle-aged spinster who, repressed by the domination of her mother, winds up in a sanitarium, where her self-confidence in boosted by an understanding psychiatrist.

Driving through Los Angeles at night, they wind up at the beach. She runs upstairs and gets Blanche. Jane, realizing the police will be summoned, screams for Blanche to help her. When he sees the skeletal woman bound and gagged, he then runs from the house in horror.

While he is there, he hears a noise upstairs, as Blanche has managed to turn over her night stand in a cry for help, and goes up to her room against Jane's urgent pleadings. When a drunken Edwin comes back to confront Jane, she lets him in. He takes it as a rebuff and angrily storms away. Edwin goes to the Hudson home, but Jane will not answer the door.

She tells her son the stories of Jane's trying to kill her own sister, but he tells her off. In the meantime, Dehlia has recalled the old gossip about the Hudsons. She takes away the body in the trunk of the car at night. As she walks in and sees Blanche bound and gagged, Jane picks up the hammer and murders her.

Jane finally gives it to her. She is taking off the bolts with a hammer and screwdriver when Jane returns and finds her. Elvira demands the key to the door. Elvira waits until Jane leaves, then returns to find Blanche's door locked. Elvira comes by, but Jane tells her that Blanche is sleeping and that she is fired.

He is not sure she is serious about her act, but is drawn to the promise of money. He is not exactly what Jane imagined, but she hires him. At the urging of his mother, Dehlia Flagg (played by Bennett), a fat piano player, Edwin Flagg (played by Buono), who has no other job, goes to the Hudson home to apply. She ties Blanche up in bed and begins starving her to death.

Afterward, she calls back and, imitating Blanche's voice, tells the doctor that it was a mistake, that all is fine. She then beats and kicks Blanche. Jane returns during the call. Eventually, she crawls downstairs to call her doctor for help.

She then sees where Jane has been practicing writing the signiture Blanche Hudson. She finds a box of chocolates and devours them ravenously. While Jane is away, Blanche goes to her room in her wheelchair. She buys more liquor, has replicas made of the costumes she wore in 1917, and places an ad in the paper for a musical accompanist.

She embezzles Blanche's money, cashing forged checks at the bank. Jane decides to revive her childhood act. She serves disgusting things, such as a dead rat, and gets a big kick out of Blanche's repulsion. Imitating Blanche's voice, she tells him she has changed her mind about selling the house.

She then goes downstairs and calls the lawyer. She tears out her buzzer and phone cord. The movie turns to horror as Jane begins to grotesquely abuse Blanche. She says, "The studio was too busy giving you the big buildup!" When she asks about the call and gets a reply, she calls Blanche a liar.

When Blanche replies yes and gives more detail, Jane tells her that she made a picture that year too, that it was never even shown in the United States. When Blanche tells her she was watching it, Jane angrily asks if she remembers what year she made that picture. She then comes upstairs where Blanche is sitting in her wheelchair watching one of her movies on TV and abruptly turns off the set. Jane eavesdrops on the call.

Blanche calls her lawyer and asks him to sell the house. The weekly cleaning woman, Elvira Stitt (played by Norman), sees through Jane and tries to get Blanche to have her committed. Blanche (played by Crawford) is an invalid stuck upstairs in her bedroom. Jane hates and resents her sister, as well as the confounded buzzer she uses to summon her.

Bates (played by Lee), who asks her to tell Blanche how much she has been enjoying her old movies that are airing on television. She is rude and snubs the neighbor, Mrs. Jane (played by Davis), who is completely forgotten by the public, is now a grotesque, drunken figure who wears a ton of make-up. The years have passed.

Blanche allowed her to stay on and care for her and her house as a flunky. She had guilt and remorse. As she was drunk, she could not remember trying to murder her sister. Jane was found drunk by the police in a hotel room.

Blanche was paralyzed by the crash. The crash is heard, as well as a piercing scream. All that is seen in the movie is the lower part of the body of the young woman walking up to the gates, the other woman putting the car in gear and slamming her foot down on the gas pedal, then the woman in front of the gates begin to run. One evening, as they returned from a party, one of the sisters got out of the car to open the gates.

Jane would get drunk at parties and mimic and mock Blanche, who she was jealous of. She lived with her sister in Blanche's Hollywood home. Jane could not act and went nowhere in Hollywood. When they grew up, Blanche Hudson became a famous movie star.

Their mother comforted Blanche. Her sister, Blanche (played by Gillespie as a child), watched with sadness as Jane, who always got her way, was idolized by her adoring public. Her father gave in. Jane Hudson (played by Allred as a child) was a child star of the vaudeville stage in 1917 who was billed as "Baby Jane." She was a spoiled brat who demanded an ice cream, or else she would not greet her fans.

134 mins.; black-and-white. It began a trend of movies featuring older women in peril or on the brink of insanity, a genre colloquially referred to as psycho-biddy. It was nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Bette Davis), Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Victor Buono), Best Cinematography, Black-and-White and Best Sound. The movie won the Academy Award for Best Costume Design, Black-and-White.

It was adapted for the screen by Lukas Heller, based on the novel What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? by Henry Farrell. This classic was directed by Robert Aldrich. psychological/horror motion picture starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, with Victor Buono, Marjorie Bennett, Maidie Norman, Anna Lee, Julie Allred, and Gina Gillespie. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? is a 1962 Warner Bros.