the audience applauded

Sadly Over-hyped

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

This film is occupied by a great cast and is full of interesting characters and performances. In particular I enjoyed Hepburn's Violet Venable, her eccentricities and open scenes in the garden, especially with the Venus Fly Trap. The story is a bit veiled to make palatable for the times but overall I think its still expressed affectively. Being based on a play it does feel a bit stagey at times. It also feels a bit melodramatic at times, but despite these shortcomings I found this film very interesting and entertaining. It's definitely not for everyone and I guess I could identify it as a guilty pleasure, but for those who are curious I think you should give it a try and judge for yourself.

It's sad to think that for most people the name Elizabeth Taylor draws up images of an overweight overly made up jewelry bedecked fading actress known more for her long time involvement with Richard Burton or that she was friends with Michael Jackson. Taylor was so much more than that. Tabloids seem to rule though so the rest is forgotten. Ignored is the fact she began as a child actress, that she moved on to leading lady roles in some classic films and that she displayed a great acting prowess in movies like WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOLFE actually winning for that performance and that she was nominated 5 times winning twice. It's easy to see why she would be nominated when watching this film.The story opens in a New Orleans mental hospital trying to stay afloat and seeking funding. Their star attraction is a young psycho-surgical doctor named Dr. John Cukrowicz (Montgomery Clift). Using new techniques he's doing all he can for his patients, never rushing to use the methods he masters but trying to find other solutions when possible.John is sent by hospital administrator Dr. Hockstader (Albert Dekker) to talk to wealthy Violet Venerable (Katherine Hepburn) about her niece Catherine Holly (Taylor). Catherine was there with Violet's son Sebastian when he died and has since told a tale that Violet claims is mere babbling. She claims to want to help Catherine but in truth she wants her lobotomized in hopes of silencing her.John doesn't just randomly do the procedure though, instead trying to help his patients. Meeting with Catherine he hears her story and realizes that something is hidden in the deepest recesses of her mind that won't come out and help her heal. His job remains throughout the film to help Catherine find out what it is that is causing her such mental trauma and at the same time why this news would cause Violet to want him to perform such an operation on the girl.Based on the play by Tennessee Williams with a screenplay by Gore Vidal, the story is filled with references to a most controversial topics at the time, homosexuality. The inferences are there from the start so it shouldn't be a spoiler to realize that Sebastian had something to hide that his domineering mother is unwilling to discuss or contemplate all the while knowing the truth. Catherine is a naïve character here never realizing quite what Sebastian is. It is her innocence and the determination of Violet to protect her own mental illusions that makes up the drama in the film.The movie takes its time to unravel the story it tells and does so with skill. The performances on display show actors at the top of their game though much has been said about the problems faced by Clift while shooting. Having suffered an injury in a car wreck he was dependent on drugs and alcohol and was trying to get over that dependency. It was Taylor, the top box office star at the time, who wielded her power of popularity to force the studio to hire Clift, one of the many displays of compassion she showed people during her lifetime.Both Hepburn and Taylor were nominated for their performances but both lost. The film was a financial hit at the time but now seems unknown to most. Offering a solid story that's sad and hopefully it will be rediscovered on disc.Twilight Time has done a great job of presenting this film in the most beautiful way imaginable. While a black and white film their handling of the presentation here offers the most crisp and clean looking copy I've ever seen, a 1080p hi def edition. Extras are limited to an isolated music and effects track and the original trailer. As always the disc is limited to just 3,000 copies so if interested by one today.

Violet Venable had a very close relationship with her son Sebastian. Too close. Then suddenly, last summer, Sebastian died while vacationing in Europe with his cousin Catherine. How exactly did Sebastian die? A heart attack says Violet. But Catherine said something different. Her obscene babbling, as Violet puts it, about the events of last summer landed Catherine in a mental institution. And Violet wants that obscene babbling stopped. She wants Catherine lobotomized, wants those thoughts cut out of her brain. And with the wealthy Violet willing to make a large donation to the local mental hospital, financing a whole new surgical wing, hospital administrator Dr. Hockstader is all too ready and willing to have a chunk of Catherine's brain cut out. But young Dr. Cukrowicz, the man who's actually going to be doing the cutting, has serious reservations. Catherine doesn't seem particularly insane to him. She now can't remember what happened last summer. But she wants to. Why is her aunt so desperate to see this surgery performed? Is Violet looking to have insane thoughts cut out of Catherine's brain? Or is she looking to remove some horrible, unspeakable truth about Sebastian before Catherine can remember it? From the moment we, and Dr. Cukrowicz, meet Violet it is obvious there is something off about this woman. It really doesn't seem like she's all there. Her relationship with her son, as she herself describes it, was rather bizarre. It's all a mystery, everything is unclear. Well, one thing is clear actually. Violet wants Catherine lobotomized and she wants it done now. Why? Dr. Cukrowicz would sure love to find out. When he goes to meet Catherine he doesn't find her to be insane. She's a young woman who went through a traumatic event who now must deal with an aunt who would like to see her turned into a mindless zombie. If only she could remember what really happened last summer. But Violet is not going to let that happen. She's putting the pressure on Dr. Hockstader and the administrator wants his new surgical wing. He wants Dr. Cukrowicz to slice that girl's brain open right now. Time is running out.Tension really builds as the knife hangs above Catherine's head. Dr. Cukrowicz is a good man who wants to help Catherine. He wants to find the truth. As things progress it becomes more and more obvious that Violet is quite the villain. She wants that truth hidden away forever. If Catherine's brain must be destroyed to accomplish that so be it. It will all come to a head in a gripping, dramatic conclusion. Who will be able to handle the truth? The film is very well performed. Katharine Hepburn creates that air of bizarre mystery around Violet and is suitably cold and villainous as needed. Elizabeth Taylor is excellent as Catherine. She may seem a little over-the-top at times, a bit hysterical. But with Catherine confronted with a lobotomy, and trying to face up to the horrors of what happened with Sebastian, a little hysteria seems appropriate. It's a very strong, powerful performance. And it had to be to match up with Hepburn who, as always, has such a presence about her. Montgomery Clift, in playing Dr. Cukrowicz, has a much less showy part than either of the leading ladies. He has to ground the film a bit and he does so quite well. A desperately needed cool head. The film is a bit talky, there is nothing very cinematic about it. The story's origins as a stage play show up in lengthy monologues which work less well on screen than on stage. But at least those monologues are in capable hands, performed by a pair of legendary actresses who can make the most of the material. Give Clift credit for his contribution but it is clearly Hepburn and Taylor who make the film. Violet or Catherine. Which, if either of them, is truly mad? To know this we must get to the truth of what happened suddenly, last summer. The truth shall set you free? We shall see. This film's journey towards the truth is a very compelling one.

A Tennessee Williams' play's film adaption, with Gore Vidal as the screenplay writer, stars three Hollywood luminaries, Hepburn, Taylor and Clift, and considering its glaringly contentious but majorly underplayed theme of taboos in the carnal knowledge (owing to the rigid censorship at that time), it is a technically thespians' wheelhouse with a chiefly in-door production scale (nabbed two Oscar nominations for Hepburn and Taylor), last but not the least, it is directed by Joseph. L. Mankiewicz, the consummate actor's director (ALL ABOUT EVE 1950, 9/10; CLEOPATRA 1963, 6/10; SLEUTH 1972, 7/10), so if you are oblivious of the play or the story, wait and see to be shocked and amazed spontaneously. A wealthy widow Ms. Violet Venable (Hepburn), loses her mollycoddling son Sebastian one year earlier during his vocation in Spain with her niece Catherine Holly (Taylor), who after witnessing Sebastian's death, goes mad and acts erratically during her confinement in the convent, so Violet finds Doctor Cukrowicz (Clift), a first-rate dab hand of psychosurgery,with a munificent proposition to finance the state asylum where he works, under one conditional that he should lobotomise Catherine. This is a moral challenge for Cukrowicz firstly, but when he meets Catherine in person and is intrigued by her side of story, his decision tips the scale in her favour. Finally under the influence of hypnotherapy, Catherine is induced to divulge what had happened last summer, the superimposition of her narrative and footages build up to the shocking truth of Sebastian's demise. The story provides a substantial platform for Hepburn and Taylor to duke it out, a ruthless matriarch will go to great lengths to cover up his dead son's nature vs. an innocent lamb with a perturbed soul suffering from beholding a Mondo Cane brutality. Both are at the top of their games, Taylor is shockingly vulnerable in her plain attire and make-up free candidness, all the more voluptuously alluring, her final recount of what she saw "suddenly, last summer" is one of the most emotionally-charging showpiece ever, it is the spectacle you only need to watch once. Hepburn, is not endowed with as much screen time as Taylor, however, exudes her majestic viciousness through the tour-de-force eloquence and cadences of her utterance, from her first scene descending as an imposing empress from a lift, viewers will be ceaselessly enthralled by her domineering splendour, and in the end, one can even partially side with her as a mother entrapped by the over-bonding relationship with her only son, which is ghastly unhealthy, but a mother's love is unreserved, remorse can invoke the cruelest retaliation and her final scenes indicate she is another living victim as well. Clift, is the bridge between the two strong female roles, as we would know, it was the twilight years of his career, a physical jadedness is pervading with his presence, he is a listener, a reluctant mediator, a conscientious doctor, yet never dare to steal the thunder from his two extraordinary co-stars. Mercedes McCambridge and Gary Raymond are Catherine's avaricious mother and brother respectively, ludicrously dampens the madhouse intensity with their simpleton's wickedness. The suspenseful score from Malcolm Arnold sets the primary tone in the very beginning, a recurring skeleton in the luxuriant garden with the Venus' flytrap is a not-too-subtle clue of the theme, "quiet desperation is the word for most lives", words with wisdom are bountiful, the indelible sea turtle fable at the Encantadas echoes Sebastian's singular destiny, the most mystifying character we have learnt from a post-mortem viewpoint, a self-reflective plea from Williams maybe, and indeed should be put on the remake list, Todd Haynes will be a right choice for the director chair, someone who is competent and independent enough to explicate on the taboos and enliven the mise-en-scene, then pass the roles to Julianne Moore and Michelle Williams, and if there is any justice in the Oscar game, their time would finally arrive!