...and I'd forgotten, not so much how wonderful she is, but rather how unlikely and, somehow, reptilian. She's patently too young to be Mrs. Robinson, a beautiful woman of 36 pretending to be an older one in at least her 40s, if not more. She's playacting in a broad yet wholly convincing way - abrupt, imperious, amused. And she's infinitely effective.
With her cigarettes, her low, breathy voice, her supercilious glances into the middle distance, she's the very incarnation of rapacity. Remembering that when she was unable to pick up her Oscar in 1962, it was accepted instead by Joan Crawford, one wonders if Bancroft hadn't been observing the type first-hand.
It's a brilliant film, and Anne Bancroft is its cold, calculating heart.
Imperious. Supercilious. Rapacity.
ReplyDeleteOh, my my my my, what an eager little mind.
"The most attractive of all my parents' friends." Indeed. Jx
ReplyDeleteIn the end, though, to me, it will always be a movie about the presence of Alice Ghostley and, especially, Marion Lorne.
ReplyDeleteAny movie that can boast Esmeralda AND Aunt Clara is A-Okay in my book.
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