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What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

Drama · Horror · Thriller · 1962

A former vaudeville child star viciously torments her paraplegic sister in their decaying Hollywood mansion.

Movie details

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

“Sister, sister, oh so fair, why is there blood all over your hair?”

1962 Drama · Horror · Thriller 2h 15m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

8.0 / 10

67.2K votes

Rotten Tomatoes

91 %

Tomatometer

Metacritic

75 / 100

Metascore

TMDB

7.9 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

A former vaudeville child star viciously torments her paraplegic sister in their decaying Hollywood mansion.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over What Ever Happened to Baby Jane??

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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Where it lives

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Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Robert Aldrich

Written by

Lukas Heller

Bette Davis

Bette Davis

Baby Jane Hudson

Joan Crawford

Joan Crawford

Blanche Hudson

Victor Buono

Victor Buono

Edwin Flagg

Wesley Addy

Wesley Addy

Marty McDonald

Julie Allred

Julie Allred

Young Baby Jane Hudson

A

Anne Barton

Cora Hudson

Marjorie Bennett

Marjorie Bennett

Dehlia Flagg

Court is in session

Put What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Big-Idea Head

“Form is the argument.”

Every composed frame and deliberate cut is evidence that control can be thrilling in its own right.

The prosecution The Popcorn Loyalist

“Technique in search of a pulse.”

Immaculate construction is still construction. The film may be too busy proving its craft to feel alive.