In this classic Universal film Jessica Tandy plays a refined woman cast aside by a handsome man (Charles Boyer). And as her subsequent behavior demonstrates, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
The story might have worked better if Tandy was playing a mentally unstable wife or a hostile ex-wife. Or if there had been a huge backstory where she was his first love, things didn't work out, and he moved on but she never got over it. Instead, Boyer has a perfectly refined wife played by Rachel Kempson who becomes ill and dies. After a sufficient period of mourning, Boyer realizes he has fallen in love with a much younger woman (Ann Blyth).
Their May-December romance is unconventional to say the least, and it sets tongues wagging in the couple's upper crust community. This drives Tandy's character to emotional extremes since she secretly hoped he would have chosen her after his wife's death. She is harboring her own unrequited feelings. But since there is no real backstory, we don't really learn how these intense feelings on her part even came about in the first place.
In spite of the various inadequacies of the plot, Tandy has more than enough skill to etch out a strong characterization. She gives us a despondent woman who only wants to be loved. It is the curse of her character, Janet Spence, to be in the same socio-economic circle as Henry Maurier (Boyer). She wouldn't have been able to avoid him if she tried, since they share a lot of the same friends and acquaintances.
We're not really supposed to root for Janet, but Tandy does such a good job drawing us in, that we cannot help but feel total sympathy for her...even when her more heinous deeds come to light.
Ann Blyth, lovely as she may be, is the weakest link in the cast. She does not have the acting chops or experience that Boyer or Tandy bring to the proceedings. And when you put her alongside other supporting players like Mildred Natwick, Cedric Hardwicke and John Williams, plus Kempson, she pales even more by comparison. Still, I think Blyth projects the requisite amount of naivety.
Getting back to Jessica Tandy, she gives a dark performance. And it is no surprise that she would do electrifying things on Broadway- for example, playing Blanche Dubois in Elia Kazan's original stage version of 'A Streetcar Named Desire.'
In the 50s & 60s Miss Tandy would occasionally turn up in films or on television shows. She experienced a career resurgence in the 1980s, and eventually received an Oscar for DRIVING MISS DAISY (1989). But I think she gives her very best performance as jilted, demented Janet whose ability to exact vengeance makes Cruella de Vil look like an amateur.
The story might have worked better if Tandy was playing a mentally unstable wife or a hostile ex-wife. Or if there had been a huge backstory where she was his first love, things didn't work out, and he moved on but she never got over it. Instead, Boyer has a perfectly refined wife played by Rachel Kempson who becomes ill and dies. After a sufficient period of mourning, Boyer realizes he has fallen in love with a much younger woman (Ann Blyth).
Their May-December romance is unconventional to say the least, and it sets tongues wagging in the couple's upper crust community. This drives Tandy's character to emotional extremes since she secretly hoped he would have chosen her after his wife's death. She is harboring her own unrequited feelings. But since there is no real backstory, we don't really learn how these intense feelings on her part even came about in the first place.
In spite of the various inadequacies of the plot, Tandy has more than enough skill to etch out a strong characterization. She gives us a despondent woman who only wants to be loved. It is the curse of her character, Janet Spence, to be in the same socio-economic circle as Henry Maurier (Boyer). She wouldn't have been able to avoid him if she tried, since they share a lot of the same friends and acquaintances.
We're not really supposed to root for Janet, but Tandy does such a good job drawing us in, that we cannot help but feel total sympathy for her...even when her more heinous deeds come to light.
Ann Blyth, lovely as she may be, is the weakest link in the cast. She does not have the acting chops or experience that Boyer or Tandy bring to the proceedings. And when you put her alongside other supporting players like Mildred Natwick, Cedric Hardwicke and John Williams, plus Kempson, she pales even more by comparison. Still, I think Blyth projects the requisite amount of naivety.
Getting back to Jessica Tandy, she gives a dark performance. And it is no surprise that she would do electrifying things on Broadway- for example, playing Blanche Dubois in Elia Kazan's original stage version of 'A Streetcar Named Desire.'
In the 50s & 60s Miss Tandy would occasionally turn up in films or on television shows. She experienced a career resurgence in the 1980s, and eventually received an Oscar for DRIVING MISS DAISY (1989). But I think she gives her very best performance as jilted, demented Janet whose ability to exact vengeance makes Cruella de Vil look like an amateur.