Della

I remember watching "Della" on late-night TV when I was a teenager. I did not realize it, in fact, WAS made for the small screen. Perhaps I found this film fascinating because my Mom's name was Della (and not such a common name).

There's just something about Joan Crawford that has always intrigued me. In this movie she carries herself regally throughout. She is simply beautiful, and her presence is impeccable. She plays a rather long-suffering, yet tough-as-nails mother to Diane Baker (who lives with a dark secret in a dark house).

Paul Burke does his best to challenge Miss Crawford, but her portrayal of Della is a superb, late entry for her talent. I wish more women would grow into their looks graciously the way Joan Crawford did. She's about 60 in this role, but she doesn't try to look 35...kudos to her choice wardrobe. I rather wish this 70-minute film would have indeed been made into a TV series as originally intended.

Even though later years would cast a pall on Joan's mothering skills (which to this day I doubt), in "Della" she is brazen at times and no-nonsense with her daughter Jenny, yet she conveys an extremely emotional, believable side to her love for her only child. I wonder if her tears in this movie are a mirror of her real life at that time.

It was only 11 years after the release of this film that I wrote to Joan and received an autographed book of hers (from her home in New York City). Even though Crawford had, to put it mildly, many more important and well-known movies, "Della" sticks with me as almost a final glimpse into the star quality and Hollywood glamour that in 1964 was nearly on the way out. I don't believe Joan Crawford fans would regret watching this and seeing a trooper of the studios put a professional spin on a mysterious, almost-surreal story.

This was produced after Crawford's camp Whatever Happened to Baby Jane comeback. 1965? It appears it was on the shelf for at least a year and a half.

As a Crawford vehicle, this is pretty dull. For the most part, Joan Crawford films after 1950 were pure camp. This one is not so unintentionally funny unless you count all these scenes with Vaseline on the lens, her overly dramatic poses or her 1963 Oscars hair. I kept waiting for a Pepsi bottle to appear.

The bright spot is Diane Baker. This was made during her studio contract years where she was properly groomed and given parts commensurate with her looks and talent. Well, except this part. She would go on to one more good film, Mirage, before being kicked to the TV movie curb.

This is essentially a soap opera in so many ways, and the money spent (or lack of it) on location settings or interiors appears to be minimal. Crawford plays Della, a grand, nervous, demanding, slightly off-kilter grande dame who hides in isolation with her strange daughter high above the city's noise and hustle. A hot-shot lawyer operating for an outside corporation wants to purchase a huge chunk of Crawford's property--but she's not budging! Nobody pushes Joan around!

What plot follows is not half as mesmerizing as the period automobiles in glittering pastels or the various fashion statements that Crawford parades as if she had been born to them (one may notice, however, that almost all of her close-ups shift to a very soft focus--no need to adjust your television). Della has lived in this lavishly furnished mansion for decades, but if one looks closely at the garish flower arrangements, the truly tatty color combinations in the carpets and curtains and the weird accent colors chosen by some set decorator in a very big hurry with a very small choice, the corners cut are clear. The same goes for the tacky statues plopped down around the pool, particularly the one dubbed "The Sun God," looking like something from an old Tarzan movie that keeps ending up with flowers stuffed in its mouth for no apparent reason.

But reason isn't what this frenetic melodrama is all about--as you can tell from this review, half the fun of it is enjoying the trappings of a late period Tinseltown Product, a sprinkling of several fine character actors--Charles Bickford and Richard Carlson (looking utterly exhausted!) and the always commanding Joan , rising above the situation just as she did in Mildred Pierce, Flamingo Road or the almost perfect Humoresque . By this time, however, the studios were largely finished, had sold of most of their lavish inventory, and only cared about what money might be made from television. This is primarily a curiosity, and one must bring a good deal of suspended disbelief to the party to enjoy it.

This had originally been made for the small screen and had a cast to match - with the exception of Joan Crawford. But if the movies had got smaller, Joan Crawford hadn't - this is certainly no less than a full wattage star performance, even perhaps her best. It was a vehicle for a reprise of her earlier roles and a powerful demonstration of her ability to command the best for herself - best role, best dialogue, best costume, best sets, and, just possibly, no hint of competition from the rest of the cast. While she interacted with credibly, her performance utterly dominated. Even the story which was somewhat ramshackle nevertheless became coherent around the Joan Crawford character. Her bit of the ship at least would be ship-shape - or she'd damned well see that it was. It perhaps suggests that a troublesome, demanding star can be right and the audience the lasting gainer from the targeted exercise of star-power.

Saw this yesterday on Talking Pictures TV a new UK free to air terrestial TV station on Freeview ch81, dedicated to old, mainly British, movies.

I wish it was a little longer, something is missing. Anyway, the beautiful Diane Baker is excellent embodying a mentally unbalanced young woman. Joan Crawford, a top expert on the characters of very strong women, here she manages to make you shiver only with the force of her steel eyes. Paul Burke and Charles Bickford, as son and father, are good. Worth seeing!