Rating: 
Summary: VOT'S A MUDDAH TO DO?
Review: Carol Burnett brough further immortality to this Lady [Pierce, NOT Crawfoprd - no one can quite match up to her legend ..... Dunaway perhaps ....] - however, not forgetting the parodied version .... Miss Crawford brings IMMENSE deptth, passion, anguish and Beauty [yes, and what a Great Beauty!]to this role.From the inception as the abused housewife - living through her children - the youngest - just a delight - the elder ........ another twisted seed..... through loss to material gain to eventual betrayal - totally unforgettable once seen. Magnificent Art direction - Was the cigarette smoke orchestrated?
We don't care - it's brilliant! Not to be missed!
Rating:
Summary: If you think your kids are bad. . .
Review: Joan is brilliant, but don't overlook the equally brilliant performance of Anne Blyth, as the world's most horrid daughter.
This movie is about Joan's relationship with her children and her climb to be a success because of her children. It's also a great murder mystery. Poor Joan! She plays the hard-working mother, willing to sacrafice anything and everything to give her daughters all that she did not have. She loses her husband in the process and finds a job as a waitress. She keeps her job a secret to prevent her self-centered eldest, played by Blyth, from finding out. But Blyth does find out and lets her mother know in one of many successful attempts to humiliate her mother. Joan survives and manages to provides for her children. Then tragedy strikes. Then Joan forges ahead with even more determination, and makes herself a success, while Blyth continues to, somehow, grow more and more selfish, while Joan tries to keep up with her daughter's greed. Watching Joan build her own successful business is a great part of the movie.
Rating:
Summary: Crawford Cops a Highly Deserved Oscar
Review: Joan Crawford had just left MGM for Warner Brothers and was determined to make a big hit for her new studio. Michael Curtiz, who some three years earlier directed the studio's magnificent masterpiece, "Casablanca", was selected to join forces with the brunette star and the result was dynamite, as Crawford marched to a Best Actress Academy Award in "Mildred Pierce." The film was an adaptation by screenwriter Ronald McDougal of the James M. Cain novel, which marked one of three successive adaptive triumphs from one of his best sellers, glittering successes for three major female acting greats. While "Mildred Pierce" was a soaring 1945 triumph for Crawford, Barbara Stanwyck had recently scaled the heights in "Double Indemnity" in 1944 and Lana Turner would receive her greatest plaudits for "The Postman Always Rings Twice" in 1946. Crawford plays devoted mother Mildred Pierce, who is determined above all else to provide daughter Ann Blyth with all of the things she had been denied. She begins by making pies for neighbors for extra money and struggles as a waitress in a busy downtown Los Angeles restaurant, but soon she scores a breakthrough and starts her own eaterie, which soon develops into a successful chain. The film begins with Crawford being interrogated after her disloyal husband, Zachary Scott, has been murdered at her beach house. A flashback brings the story into the present, revealing the interesting array of characters who inhabit Mildred's life. Bruce Bennett is sincere but luckless, having failed in the real estate business, after which the couple separates. The daugher Bennett reveals as his favorite dies tragically of pneumonia, leaving only the spoiled Veda, played by Ann Blyth, concerning whom he warns Crawford, who fails to pay proper heed. Crawford is forever and unsuccessfully pursued romantically by wise cracking and unethical Jack Carson, who makes a deal for her to obtain some property from Southern California socialite Zachary Scott on which she can start her first restaurant. Eventually she will become romantically involved with Scott and ultimately marries him to satisfy Blyth, a social climber impressed with Scott's pedigree. Supplying wisecracking comments throughout is the inimitable Eve Arden, who serves as Crawford's Woman Friday in her restaurant operation. It is Arden who delivers the brilliant script's premiere line when she tartly asserts, "Veda (Blyth) is living proof that alligators have the right idea. They eat their young." Eventually the L.A. police solve the murder after many twists and turns of the complex series of relationships are exposed. The film succeeds brilliantly into taking viewers inside the intricate world of a whole constellation of uniquely fascinating characters. Audience members cannot help but feel that they know them much better than one could imagine over such a brief period of time, the result of strong plotting by Cain in his novel and excellent character revealing dialogue by McDougal. The action moves throughout at a brisk pace, reflective of the brilliant Hungarian director Michael Curtiz.
Rating:
Summary: MILDRED FIERCE.....
Review: I've had this on tape for years and can't wait for the DVD. This is probably the ultimate Crawford movie. She even won her only Oscar for it. When we first meet Mildred she's a beleagured houswife saddled with two daughters and an unfaithful husband. She bakes pies and sells them to the neighbors to make ends meet. When she finally throws her husband out, she gets a job as a waitress. But she has a bigger problem: her oldest daughter, Veda, is an ungrateful little wretch who is never satisfied. Mildred can't do anything right to please her. Mildred finally learns the restaurant business thanks to her friend---the matchless Eve Arden---and opens her own place. But Veda still isn't satisfied so Mildred expands her business into a chain of "Mildreds'". The youngest daughter dies and Mildred is devastated but Veda, bless her, is DELIGHTED. She can now have Mother all to herself and milk her for every cent she has. Veda turns into the daughter-from-hell as Mildred becomes a restaurant tycoon. But darker waters lay ahead for Mildred as she goes bankrupt thanks to the no-good playboy she marries for title to further please that worthless little tramp Veda. He even begins fooling around with Veda until she shoots him and tries to get Mildred to take the blame. Of all the rags-to-riches dames Crawford ever played this is the ultimate. Director Michael Curtiz didn't want Crawford for Mildred and humiliated her publicly but Crawford stuck it out and won him over. James M. Cains' novel had to be toned down for the screen but it still ranks as classic film noir and very sticky soap opera. Ann Blyth is mightily impressive as the evil Veda and matches Crawford scene for scene through all their confrontations. The film is a must see for Crawford, Blyth and the wonderful Eve Arden. Carol Burnett even parodied it in a classic sketch on one of her old TV shows. You know she had to love it as much as we do.
Rating:
Summary: I'd make it all better mildred, if I could.
Review: This movie gets five stars in my book because having watched it on television just once and then only a child, surrounded by my jabbering brothers and sisters, in what seems like a hundred years ago, even so I have never forgotten how much I wanted to climb inside that old telly and bash that ingrates face in. Joan in this movie was superb, and though I know she is an icon who's done loads of movies, and I have probably caught most by now on rainy weekends and late at night, I cannot remember any but this one. Joan Crawford as Mildred Pierce gave a performance that should rank as the zenith of acting skill....the measure by which all female leads are held.
Rating:
Summary: LOVE THIS GAL!
Review: HOW long has it been? 50 years? THIS one still stands proudly and that's really thanks to Miss Crawford's unforgettable Oscar-winning performance as the much-maligned mama [with a bow in Ann Blyth's direction - equally stellar as the daughter from hell!] Paintakingly photogrpahed, set, orchestrated, whatever, the images are forever brilliant! [Where on earth do see this today in our era of CGI and all of that lovely technical stuff?]. THIS is what movies are/will and should be like - 'escape and entertainment' folks - a Hollywood product at its finest! Companion? "Now Voyager" with Davis of course!
Rating:
Summary: Joan Crawford . . . Home at last!
Review: After being under contract for years at MGM as one of that studio's top moneymakers and workhorses, Joan Crawford was then ungratefully cut loose by the top brass after being labelled "Box Office Poison." In legendary fashion, she proved her critics wrong and came back with a vengeance when she immediately signed with Warner Bros. and won an Oscar with her new home studio in this movie. Although Crawford made many wonderful films at Metro, she always seemed somewhat to be the odd woman out among more refined types such as Garbo, Shearer, Lamarr, among others. But at Warner's her persona fit right in with that studio's roster of female stars--hardened and determined yet sometimes vulnerable women such as Davis, Stanwyk, Sheridan, and Lupino. I always thought that Crawford found her true "home" when she signed with the gritty Warner Bros. from the glamorous and frothy MGM, but it's just as well she arrived there later because she and Davis would have clashed all the more sooner since they would have competed for the same type of roles. Crawford was born for the role of "Mildred Pierce," portraying to perfection the loving and (too) devoted mother willing to do anything for her child. The other principals are superb, with Ann Blyth as Mildred's ingrate daughter whose lovely face and tacked-on sweetness masks a venomous nature, Zachary Scott as the mercenary cad who romances both mother and daughter, and Eve Arden as Mildred's tell-it-as-it-is pal. A powerful, must-see melodrama, this is the quintessential Crawford performance.
Rating:
Summary: An Awesome Movie
Review: Mildred Pierce's second husband, Monte Beregon, is dead. And so the story unravels as Mildred tells her "story" to the police. It's all a mysterious cover-up. And is worth watching to the very end! I loved this movie!!! If you are a fan of the "classics", this is one of the greatest I've seen. Joan Crawford plays Mildred. She has two daughters, Veda and Kay. Her husband up and leaves them, and now Mildred must get a job. Kay catches a bad case of pneumonia, and dies. Veda, who is the older daughter, doesn't turn out to be such a nice girl. She grows into a coniving young woman, who bribes someone for money so she can get away from her embarrassment of a mother. Veda is played by Ann Blyth...What an actress!!! Veda is evil to the core, and Blyth really pulls it off. I'd hate to give to much of this movie away! It's a must see!! This movie is brilliantly photographed, and Joan Crawford is totally awesome as Mildred. I haven't seen many of her films, but it's clear that Crawford is in her prime here. She really plays this character to the extreme. She certainly did deserve the Oscar! The screenplay of this movie is great for it's time, and has some hilarious lines that are delivered dead on by the actor's. This is "film noir" at it's best. Go rent it!!! You won't be disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: Joan Crawford Playing Against Character as Total "Door-Mat"
Review: Joan Crawford is not very credible as the self-sacrificing mother of teenage brat daughter. "Mommie" cleans up every mess little Miss Prissie makes, but the last "request" is turned down: Joan Crawford will NOT take the "heat" for daughter dearest's killing mom's boyfiend. -- Joan Crawford has always been a drama queen, but this film takes the cake (and the Oscar) for her best performance. The furs and shoulder pads are all in place. Enjoyable "Hollywood" fare.
Rating:
Summary: the greatest comeback of them all!!!
Review: mildred pierce was first of all, for me anyway, slightly confusing, as you will well see as soon as you watch it, but come the second third fourth etc time you see it you will love it! It opens mysteriously as a man is shot unmercifully six times, says mildred and dies. Crawford runs from the house but is later arrested, and soon begins to recount her story on the lead up to the incident. This is a fasinating soao opera style movie with some brilliant acting, the leads are overshadowed by crawfords maternal airness yet brewing below confidence and courage. Her spoiled daught is terrific and mildreds friend and co-worker is perfectly comical, on her hate hate hate attitude towards men, look as she goes to bite mildreds banker!!! this was the only oscar (and well deserved) for Crawford, as well as being nominated for 5 other awards, including best picture and two best supporting actresses.
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