I recently watched a Bette Davis film from 1952, The Star. Holy cow. What a train wreck. The internet tells that it was a financial flop, but my goodness, what a roller-coaster adventure for us to see today.
The plot is best summed up by AI and Wikipedia:
The film follows Margaret Elliot (played by Bette Davis), a former Oscar-winning movie star who is completely broke and desperately clinging to the final threads of her fading fame. Unable to accept that Hollywood has moved on to younger talent, she faces a harsh reality check when she is arrested for drunk driving and publicly humiliated.
A former lover and boatbuilder named Jim Johannsen (Sterling Hayden) bails her out and tries to help her find peace outside of the spotlight. However, Margaret remains utterly determined to launch a massive Hollywood comeback, even when offered a demeaning, unglamorous character role that shatters her pride.
Absolutely fantastic spoiler alerts to the convoluted plot. However, there is much, much more to the film.
There is a coup de grace moment at a fabulous party she accidentally joins because she was awakened by a hundred Hollywood guests arriving. She was given a sleeping pill and placed in a child’s bedroom, which adds a macabre touch. Who does she think she’s kidding when she tries to sneak out the front door? She joins in, when noticed, only to have an intense young screenwriter float his idea for her to star as a megalomaniacal star who doesn’t realize she’s washed up. He continues that his character deserves pity because she is mentally ill. And he continues that the tragedy is that she refuses her role as a woman. With that, Margaret stands up, in a trance, and walks out, stealing the hosts’ convertible and drives off to kidnap her daughter (played with magnificent charm and earnestness by a young Natalie Wood, aged 14), and falls into the hunky, understanding arms of the impossibly kind, loving, and handsome Stering Hayden.
Say what? Some abrupt realization on the part of The Star. Of course, she saw her abysmal screen test and had her fifth nervous breakdown in the film. But she exhibited every trace of manic depressive insanity several times at a drop of the hat.
Her finest campy moment is after she threw out her disgusting sister and lurid brother-in-law, had a hissy breakdown, grabbed her Oscar statuette and a bottle of bourbon, and took Oscar on a guided Hollywood tour of celebrity homes.
Oscar stood on the dashboard, while Margaret swigged booze from the bottle with one hand, talked to Oscar, narrating the homes and occupants, and drove erratically with the other. Priceless. John Waters had nothing to do with this unhinged fever dream, but you might believe that Waters’ magnificent Serial Mom was closely akin to this film.
Margaret’s arrest, and her salvation followed the next day. Sterling Hayden, thirst trap extraordinaire bailed her out, all the while looking mighty fine. The camera lingered over his open shirt, his manspread, his everything. And his voice. Then he took Margaret and daughter on his sailboat. Be still, my heart. The Star took all he did for her in stride, never really comprehending that he was a miracle dropped on top of her. She finally got it in a hasty ending rather clumsily executed when like Saul struck by God, realizes his path, changing his name to Paul.
The Star is a film well worth the 100 minutes or so, if streamed or borrowed from your County library. The Academy gave Bette Davis an Oscar nomination for her insane role. See it and be amazed.
In her final days, Bette Davis reflected on her life and personal relationships. When asked if she had any regrets, she paused and softly said, “Maybe I should have loved a little more.”
These poignant words reflect her fierce, independent nature and are in line with the famous epitaph she chose for her headstone at Forest Lawn Memorial Park: “She did it the hard way.” AI from the internet.