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Faye Dunaway, Diana Scarwid, Steve Forrest, Howard Da Silva, Mara Hobel ... see more see more... , Rutanya Alda , Harry Goaz , Michael Edwards , Jocelyn Brando , Priscilla Pointer , Gary Allen , Selma Archerd , Xander Berkeley , Carolyn Coates , Jerry Douglas , Margaret Fairchild , Matthew Faison , Cathy Lind Hayes , Peter Jason , Virginia Kiser , S. John Launer , Russ Marin , Dick McGarvin , Nicholas Mele , Belita Moreno , Alice Nunn , Norman Palmer , Michael Talbott , David F. Price , Joseph Warren , Phillip Richard Allen , Adrian Aron , Ian Bruce , Michael D. Gainsborough , Warren Munson , David Sanderson , Arthur Taxier , Dawn Jeffory , James Kirkwood Jr. , Robert Harper , Harry Goz

When her adoptive mother Joan Crawford died in 1977, erstwhile actress/author Christina Crawford and her brother Christopher were left out of Joan Crawford's will, "for reasons which are well known to... read more read more... them." Industryites have suggested that it may have been this posthumous act of rejection rather than an alleged lifetime of parental abuse that inspired Christina Crawford to pen her scathing autobiography Mommie Dearest. The 1981 film version of this tome was evidently meant to be taken seriously, but the operatic direction by Frank Perry and the over-the-top portrayal of Joan Crawford by Faye Dunaway (whose makeup is remarkable) has always seemed to inspire loud laughter whenever and where-ever the film is shown. According to the film (and the book that preceded it), Joan Crawford was a licentious, child-beating behemoth, who stalked and postured through life as though it was one of her own pictures-more Strait-jacket than Mildred Pierce. This is the film with the notorious "wire coat hanger" scene, just in case you need a reminder. Surprisingly, one emerges from Mommie Dearest with more sympathy for the monstrous but intensely vulnerable Crawford than for her whining daughter (played as an adult by Diana Scarwid, and as a child by Mara Hobel). Our favorite scene: Joan Crawford dazedly replacing her ailing daughter in the cast of a daytime TV soap opera. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

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77% liked it

18,084 ratings

Critics

53% liked it

30 critics

PG, 2 hr. 9 min.

Directed by: Frank Perry

Release Date: September 18, 1981

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DVD Release Date: July 17, 2001

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Stats: 1,372 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (1,372)

  • blacksheepboy
    September 29, 2011
    blacksheepboy
    A narratively disjointed and episodic adaptation that is basically for those who are curious to know how was Joan Crawford's abusive relationship with her daughter, who wrote the book this film is based on. The exploitative story makes no effort in character development, but Faye... read more Dunaway is great in a histrionic, over-the-top performance.
  • ajv2688
    January 10, 2011
    ajv2688
    A fantastic drama with great actors, and a great story, I loved it, and I highly recommend it.
  • smith44
    April 7, 2010
    smith44
    Faye Dunaway is suberb as Joan Crwaford, in this scary and sometimes over the top autobiography. "No wire hangers, ever!"
  • webalina
    July 2, 2009
    webalina
    Giving this more stars than it deserves just because it's so campy and bad, but SO VERY entertaining.
  • puffchunk
    September 25, 2008
    puffchunk
    When Joan freaked out it was very fun, but there are lots of drawn out sequences that we could have lived without.
  • groaningbitch
    January 15, 2008
    groaningbitch
    mommie dearest is one of the classic camps which is so legendarily awful that it could be called "phenomenonal"...lol.

    the notorious tales of joan crawford's evil maternality has been widely known already thanks to faye dunaway's overacting in "mommie dearest" that could be co... read morensidered one of the most successfully excercised disparage ever in cinematic history. it's so malaciously achieved that i must announce that christina crawford herself is evil, draining the essence of the dead from the graveyard of her "adopted mother".

    crawford had a reputation of being brittle and hard-boiled to the bone, but she was also a glamour queen before the 50s, just reminiscent the fashion icons she had built with her stylish idiocyncracy, and her husky tone of voice which provokes defying sensuality thru her bold brazen attitudes. obviously none of those advantages is transpired in faye dunaway's caricature of crawford. dunaway's campy performance obliterates every remnant of crawford's beauty in audience's memories. each move she had made in it looks grotesquely clumsy, and her contorted face appear lunaticly horrorsome with each line of her wrinkles over carven in her complexion.

    of course, i must complain to the cosmetic apartment about dunaway's crawfordian eyebrows which seems really dramaticly exaggerated just to mock the dated fashion then, but even joan crawford herself didn't look so "twisted"...dunaway attempted to lower her vocal into the low-pitch smoldering smoker sound which was popular sign of glamour for movie stars then, dunaway did nothing but growl like a crude beast. if you view those old crawford flicks, she did have her unique way to deliver those lines with punctured shrewdness.

    "mommie dearest" certainly does a good job at defaming joan crawford, further more, it's sinister uglification to a tough surviving woman who exerts herself literarily to her tombstone. but i gotta admit the axe-swaying scene which is blandly stolen from crawford's 50s camp "strait-jacket" is absolutely hilarious. maybe gutsy females are easy targets to attack, even after her demise, you could still snatch her corpse out to whip it, for your private indulgement as well as your angst toward contemporary cultural effemination.
  • YosemiteSamFan
    August 17, 2007
    YosemiteSamFan
    A hard movie to watch. Joan Crawford was such a monster to her children - she should've been cast from Hollywood. Faye Dunaway does a great performance.
  • jjnxn
    April 4, 2007
    jjnxn
    a freak show from start to finish and totally fascinating
  • rodriguesmatthew
    April 1, 2010
    rodriguesmatthew
    Joan Crawford was a monster but Faye Dunaway makes her a monster with a heart...almost. I think this is the best performance of her career, and that's a big compliment since she's starred in three famous films, "Bonnie and Clyde", "Network", and "Chinatown". She won Oscar nomina... read moretions for all of those films and took home the prize for "Network." Yet "Mommie Dearest" is the breathing baby I see as Dunaway's triumph. The story is set through the memoirs of Christina Crawford, and though Frank Perry's direction is flawed and stagey, the performance by Dunaway seals it up as one of the best camp classics of all time. And heck, who can forget that wire hanger scene, she looked like a crazy nut. Mommie Dearest seems stagey at times but thrives with Dunways fantastic performance.

    Story: B
    Acting: A
    Direction: C
    Visuals: B
    Overall: B

    *** out of 4 stars
  • merlynsprankling
    January 1, 2008
    merlynsprankling
    This is a film about Joan Crawford's relationship with her adopted children. Played by Faye Dunaway in the central role--she looks the 'perfect' star to represent Crawford--square shoulder, the arched eyebrows, the v-shaped mouth, and when Dunaway stares, her eyes are like basili... read moresks.
    In Mommie Dearest--the emotions are so splendid, the scenes so dramatic and the experiences so brilliant.
    This is a serious film, in no way designed to be deliberately funny and yet with Dunaway's portrayal of a haunted and bitter woman, the film is a comic masterpiece by accident.
    Joan Crawford was clearly terrified of failure, and it was this fear that drove her to the kind of bizarre perfectionism and competitiveness which marked her life.

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Critic Reviews

Dave Kehr
October 30, 2007
Dave Kehr, Chicago Reader

It's rich, stimulating thought in spite of itself. Full Review

Jonathan Rosenbaum
October 30, 2007
Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

Director Frank Perry, who collaborated with three others (including producer Frank Yablans) on the script, gives it all a certain crazed conviction. Full Review

Variety Staff
October 30, 2007
Variety Staff, Variety

Dunaway does not chew scenery. Dunaway starts neatly at each corner of the set in every scene and swallows it whole, costars and all. Full Review

Roger Ebert
October 23, 2004
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

I can't imagine who would want to subject themselves to this movie. Full Review

Janet Maslin
August 30, 2004
Janet Maslin, New York Times

There is nothing to string the episodes together into a coherent drama, and no insight into Miss Crawford herself. Full Review

Josh Larsen
May 13, 2008
Josh Larsen, LarsenOnFilm

Director Frank Perry simply sits back and lets Dunaway rip. He was either supremely untalented or he purposefully intended to sabotage her. Full Review

Stefan Birgir Stefansson
February 28, 2008
Stefan Birgir Stefansson, sbs.is

Wire Hangers!

October 30, 2007
Film4

Dunaway creates the benchmark for harridans the world over but never entirely loses sympathy for her subject. It's a constant blast of high melodrama and camp. Full Review

October 30, 2007
TV Guide's Movie Guide

'No wire hangers -- ever!' That this apparently banal phrase has now achieved something like immortality is a reflection of the unbridled extravagance of Faye Dunaway's performance. Full Review

David Nusair
July 15, 2006
David Nusair, Reel Film Reviews

...relies almost entirely on Dunaway's histrionics to propel the story forward - resulting in a movie that's good for a few unintentional laughs but little else. Full Review

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Facts

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    • Louis B. Mayer: Why did you adopt me?
    • Joan Crawford: You love it don't you? YOU LOVE TO MAKE ME HIT YOU!
    • Christina Crawford: I came in and found her like this. Do you think she needs an ambulance?
    • Carol Ann: She doesn't need an ambulance. She's drunk.
    • Christina Crawford: Because I am not one of your fans!
    • Joan Crawford: No! Wire! Hangers! EVER!
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Mommie Dearest Trivia

  • This campy movie features famous lines like, "No more wire hangers!", "Tina! Bring me the axe!", and "I am not one of your fans!"  Answer »
  • "Mommie Dearest" was about which legendary Hollywood actress?  Answer »
  • Who am I? I starred in Thomas Crown Affair, Chinatown, Network, Don Juan de Marco, Mommie Dearest, Bonnie and Clyde and Barfly.  Answer »
  • What movie includes this line: "I'm not mad at you, I'm mad at the DIRT!"  Answer »
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