Cinema's Seven Deadliest Women Scorned...
By Kirsty Leckie Palmer
monday 2nd November 2009
monday 2nd November 2009
Misery (1990): Annie Wilkes (Kathy Bates)
Nutcase recluse Annie Wilkes finds her favourite novelist, Paul Sheldon (James Caan), injured and stranded in the snow after a car crash and takes him home to recover. It transpires she has no intention of letting him leave, and as she keeps him hostage to her self-righteous tantrums he becomes beholden to his number one fan to resurrect her favourite literary character, Misery Chastain, by re-writing the ending of his last novel. After attempting to escape from her smothering psychopathic clutches, Annie enacts vengeance by ‘hobbling’ him – tying his legs to a block of wood and tenderizing them with a sledgehammer.
Bitchiest Line: “God came to me last night and told me your purpose for being here. I am going to help you write a new book.”
Hard Candy (2005): Hayley Stark (Ellen Paige)
Seemingly sweet fourteen year old Hayley takes the law (and a scalpel) into her formidably capable hands as she arranges to meet with a charming photographer she finds on the internet. Two hours of gripping and precise suspense sees her expose him as a petty paedophile whilst taking him hostage in his own home, and performing a protracted, perspiration-inducing faux-castration on him before driving him to voluntarily hang himself.
Bitchiest Line: “Was I born a cute, vindictive, little bitch or... did society make me that way?”
Fatal Attraction (1987): Alex Forrest (Glenn Close)
Blueprint for bunny-boiling Alex Forrest has a quickie with married lawyer Dan Callagher (Michael Douglas). Sadly, her thwarted attempts at a protracted love affair turn to a no-holds-barred psychopathic rampage, and she stalks, threatens, and blackmails her way to a violent showdown, in which she is drowned, and then shot by her ex-lover. Handy hint – Fatal Attraction is almost as effective as castration when shown to would be cheaters.
Bitchiest line: “I love animals... I'm a great cook.”
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962): Baby Jane Hudson (Bette Davis)
Failed child star Baby Jane Hudson (Bette Davis) faces a future of obscurity and decrepitude in a sprawling Hollywood mansion, obliged to care for her wheelchair bound, and once more successful faded actress sister Blanche (Joan Crawford). Replete with Kabuki-caked makeup and faced with her sister’s televised re-runs, Hudson has free reign to vent the jealousy of a failed child star - from her wavering infantile singing of ‘I’m sending a message to Daddy’ to serving up (long before Fatal Attraction or Disney Pixar) rat-cuisine. Davis makes simmering envy an art-form in this classic psychological torture movie, never has such free and flagrant reign been given to sisterly jealousy.
Bitchiest Line: "But ya are Blanche, but ya are." (After Blanche pleads with Jane "You couldn't do this to me if I wasn't in this wheel chair.”)
Snow White (1937): The Evil Queen (Lucille Lacerne)
Generally any woman over the age of 50 that isn’t obese and fairy-winged tends to fall into the bitch category in early Disney, but as the first, and arguably the most appalling fairytale felon, Snow White’s stepmother is benchmark for the ones that follow. After a magic mirror tells her she isn’t going to win any prizes for her looks, she transform into an ancient crone and feeds her already banished stepdaughter a poisoned apple. Why she can’t just transform into a female prettier than Snow White is unclear.
Bitchiest Line: “The dwarves will think she's dead. She'll be buried alive!”
From Dusk till Dawn (1996): Santanico Pandemonium (Salma Hayek)
Clad provocatively in a bikini and a python, Hayek appears in dramatic fashion and writhes hypnotically around to Tito and Tarantula’s ‘After Dark’, reduces the testosterone-steeped regulars of the misogynistic but irresistibly-dubbed Titty-Twister bar to pulp, bewitches deviant pervert Ritchie (Quentin Tarantino) and executes a less-than-seductive finale - which involves her transforming into a gangrenous-featured vampire and attempting to bite off Tarantino’s head. Just one of the reasons nine out of ten men still would.
Bitchiest line: “You’ll lick the dog shit from my boot heel.” (To George Clooney)
Beowulf (2007): Grendel’s Mother (Angelina Jolie)
We’ve all learned Ray Winstone and CGI don’t gel, but there’s something wildly mesmeric about a metallic-fleshed Jolie as the dam of Grendel, from her hyper-sensual vocal work to the fact we can’t even bring ourselves to question why her feet are shaped like the inspiration for Christian Louboutin’s spring collection. Okay she’s nothing like the sea-hag of the Old English poem, but as a visual representation of femme fatale, she’s just what Hollywood ordered…
Bitchiest Line: “Under my spell a man like yourself could become king”.
Nutcase recluse Annie Wilkes finds her favourite novelist, Paul Sheldon (James Caan), injured and stranded in the snow after a car crash and takes him home to recover. It transpires she has no intention of letting him leave, and as she keeps him hostage to her self-righteous tantrums he becomes beholden to his number one fan to resurrect her favourite literary character, Misery Chastain, by re-writing the ending of his last novel. After attempting to escape from her smothering psychopathic clutches, Annie enacts vengeance by ‘hobbling’ him – tying his legs to a block of wood and tenderizing them with a sledgehammer.
Bitchiest Line: “God came to me last night and told me your purpose for being here. I am going to help you write a new book.”
Hard Candy (2005): Hayley Stark (Ellen Paige)
Seemingly sweet fourteen year old Hayley takes the law (and a scalpel) into her formidably capable hands as she arranges to meet with a charming photographer she finds on the internet. Two hours of gripping and precise suspense sees her expose him as a petty paedophile whilst taking him hostage in his own home, and performing a protracted, perspiration-inducing faux-castration on him before driving him to voluntarily hang himself.
Bitchiest Line: “Was I born a cute, vindictive, little bitch or... did society make me that way?”
Fatal Attraction (1987): Alex Forrest (Glenn Close)
Blueprint for bunny-boiling Alex Forrest has a quickie with married lawyer Dan Callagher (Michael Douglas). Sadly, her thwarted attempts at a protracted love affair turn to a no-holds-barred psychopathic rampage, and she stalks, threatens, and blackmails her way to a violent showdown, in which she is drowned, and then shot by her ex-lover. Handy hint – Fatal Attraction is almost as effective as castration when shown to would be cheaters.
Bitchiest line: “I love animals... I'm a great cook.”
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962): Baby Jane Hudson (Bette Davis)
Failed child star Baby Jane Hudson (Bette Davis) faces a future of obscurity and decrepitude in a sprawling Hollywood mansion, obliged to care for her wheelchair bound, and once more successful faded actress sister Blanche (Joan Crawford). Replete with Kabuki-caked makeup and faced with her sister’s televised re-runs, Hudson has free reign to vent the jealousy of a failed child star - from her wavering infantile singing of ‘I’m sending a message to Daddy’ to serving up (long before Fatal Attraction or Disney Pixar) rat-cuisine. Davis makes simmering envy an art-form in this classic psychological torture movie, never has such free and flagrant reign been given to sisterly jealousy.
Bitchiest Line: "But ya are Blanche, but ya are." (After Blanche pleads with Jane "You couldn't do this to me if I wasn't in this wheel chair.”)
Snow White (1937): The Evil Queen (Lucille Lacerne)
Generally any woman over the age of 50 that isn’t obese and fairy-winged tends to fall into the bitch category in early Disney, but as the first, and arguably the most appalling fairytale felon, Snow White’s stepmother is benchmark for the ones that follow. After a magic mirror tells her she isn’t going to win any prizes for her looks, she transform into an ancient crone and feeds her already banished stepdaughter a poisoned apple. Why she can’t just transform into a female prettier than Snow White is unclear.
Bitchiest Line: “The dwarves will think she's dead. She'll be buried alive!”
From Dusk till Dawn (1996): Santanico Pandemonium (Salma Hayek)
Clad provocatively in a bikini and a python, Hayek appears in dramatic fashion and writhes hypnotically around to Tito and Tarantula’s ‘After Dark’, reduces the testosterone-steeped regulars of the misogynistic but irresistibly-dubbed Titty-Twister bar to pulp, bewitches deviant pervert Ritchie (Quentin Tarantino) and executes a less-than-seductive finale - which involves her transforming into a gangrenous-featured vampire and attempting to bite off Tarantino’s head. Just one of the reasons nine out of ten men still would.
Bitchiest line: “You’ll lick the dog shit from my boot heel.” (To George Clooney)
Beowulf (2007): Grendel’s Mother (Angelina Jolie)
We’ve all learned Ray Winstone and CGI don’t gel, but there’s something wildly mesmeric about a metallic-fleshed Jolie as the dam of Grendel, from her hyper-sensual vocal work to the fact we can’t even bring ourselves to question why her feet are shaped like the inspiration for Christian Louboutin’s spring collection. Okay she’s nothing like the sea-hag of the Old English poem, but as a visual representation of femme fatale, she’s just what Hollywood ordered…
Bitchiest Line: “Under my spell a man like yourself could become king”.