So this is one of those old-timey things that’s misogynistic af, and figures that the goal of every ambitious woman must be to tear down and destroy other successful women. And so you’ve got an aging Bette Davis who is approached by some young ingenue who pretends to treat her like an idol, while secretly scheming to replace her.

Leaving the overtones aside, it’s not a bad plot, and it’s well-written and acted… but man, is it slow. It feels like 30 minutes of plot in a 2:15 basket. Also, there’s a really heavy-handed narration (by George Sanders, who you may remember from Journey to Italy, a much better movie from the S&S list).

I’m honestly not sure why this is even on this list. Like, Sunset Boulevard came out the same year (1950) and does the “aging woman getting pushed out of show business” thing way, way better (although they’re not really doing the same thing). Is this supposed to be an iconic performance from Bette Davis or something? I feel like it might just be that it won six Oscars; idk, AFI just feels really random sometimes.