What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

She became a psycho, that's what. In some ways, this is probably one of the most psychologically disturbing films that I have ever seen. It's been called a classic of camp, but it's high class trash, which makes it all the weirder. Bette Davis, who looks like she's been dead for a decade and someone forgot to tell her, plays the queen of all movie bitches, Baby Jane Hudson, who was once a child star in vaudeville, and later became a forgotten movie star, and is now old, ugly, and a wee bit mentally unbalanced. Joan Crawford, who only looks like she's been dead for five years, plays her sister, Blanche, who was jealous of Jane as a child, but as an adult became a famous and beloved movie star, but is now paralyzed from the waist down and taken care of by her sister. Jane has Blanche basically imprisoned in her second story bedroom and enjoys mentally torturing her by bringing her meals of steamed rat and the like. In some ways it reminded me of Billy Wilder's, Sunset Boulevard, and a subplot of the film, makes that comparisson even more appropriate. Robert Aldrich's direction is sure and he knows how to make his audience uncomfortable. It's almost unbearable watching Blanche trapped upstairs certain that her sister is trying to kill her. I can't say I particularly enjoyed the film, but it was too well made and too "interesting" to be ignored.