Next Lobotomy Room Film Club: The Star (1952) on 16 March 2023

 

/ “Never has the Hollywood story been told so frankly … so boldly … so completely! Here is every woman who ever climbed the stairway to the stars – only to find herself at the bottom, looking up!” /

/ “She fought for the power to stay on top … and almost lost the privilege and glory of being a woman!” Bette Davis and Sterling Hayden in The Star (1952) /

To commemorate “Oscar season” (full disclosure: we don’t actually care or pay attention to the Academy Awards!), on 16 March the free monthly Lobotomy Room film club presents The Star (1952)! Featuring the perennially fierce Bette Davis as Maggie Elliot, a faded fifty-something actress on the skids struggling to reignite her stalled career. “One good picture is all I need!” she screeches to her manager. Later, she confronts a parasitic sponging relative with, “Can’t you get it through your thick head that I’m broke? Dead, flat, stony broke!” 

/ “The orchids … the furs … the diamonds that were the star’s were all gone now … and nothing remained …  but the woman!” /

/ “ONLY Bette Davis – the star of stars – could accept the challenge of such a role! Only the WOMAN within her could find the penetrating insight to play it! ONLY the two-time winner of the Academy Award could give it such greatness!” /

The Star is comprehensively overshadowed by two other films where Davis played troubled ageing actresses: All About Eve (1950) and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1952). But it’s one of my favourite unsung Davis performances and the film has an appealingly harsh low-budget ambiance that lends it a gritty almost documentary feel.  Years later, Davis herself would argue “I have always felt The Star was very underrated by critics and the public.” 

/  Davis with Sterling Hayden / 

And just wait until you see the camp highlight: slurring “C’mon, Oscar! Let’s you and me get drunk!” and strapping it to the steering wheel, Maggie takes her Academy Award for a drunken joyride - and winds up in a prison cell! (In a “meta” touch, the statuette in question is one of Davis’ own).  Rounding out the cast: Natalie Wood as Maggie’s daughter and hunky Sterling Hayden as a younger actor (who just may be Maggie’s romantic saviour …). And speaking of Oscars: Davis did get nominated for Best Actress for The Star (her ninth nomination), but she lost to Shirley Booth for Come Back, Little Sheba. 

/ “The story of a woman who thought she was a star so high in the sky … that no man could touch her … until she was no longer … THE STAR!” /

Lobotomy Room Goes to the Movies is the FREE monthly film club devoted to cinematic perversity! Third Thursday night of every month downstairs at Fontaine’s bar in Dalston! Two drink minimum (inquire about the special offer £6 cocktail menu!). Numbers are limited, so reserving in advance via Fontaine’s website is essential. Alternatively, phone 07718000546 or email bookings@fontaines.bar to avoid disappointment! The film starts at 8:30 pm. Doors to the basement Bamboo Lounge open at 8:00 pm. To ensure everyone is seated and cocktails are ordered in time, please arrive by 8:15 pm at the latest.

Facebook event page.

To whet your appetite ... the outrageous trailer!