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Another Man's Poison

Another Man's Poison

List Price: $24.99
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Routine Thriller Recommended Only for Bette Fans
Review: "ANOTHER MAN'S POISON," DIRECTED BY IRVING RAPPER WHO GAVE YOU "NOW, VOYAGER, IS ABOUT AN AUTHORESS, BETTE DAVIS, WHO HAS TROUBLE WITH THE MEN IN HER LIFE. SHE HAS A HUSBAND WHO STANDS IN THE WAY OF A YOUNGER LOVER, AND THEN THERE'S GARY MERRILL, WITH EVIL INTENTIONS IN HIS HEART, WHO HAS HAD BAD DEALINGS WITH BETTE'S HUSBAND. BETTE KEEPS ALL THE BALLS IN THE AIR HERE, AND HAS WONDERFUL BITCHY ENCOUNTERS, VERY BITCHY ENCOUNTERS, WITH HER LOVER, WITH MERRILL, AND WITH HER HUSBAND. SHE STORMS AROUND THIS ENGLISH COTTAGE TALKING ABOUT HER HORSE THAT HAS BEEN KILLED, HER PET, AND HOW SHE WILL DEAL WITH THE MURDERER. ADD TO ALL THIS, POISON, THAT FINDS ITS WAY INTO BOTTLES AND FLASKS, AND WHATNOT, AND THROW IN A BODY AT THE BOTTOM OF A LAKE, AND A NOSY NEIGHBOR WHO SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE FIRST ONE KILLED, AND YOU HAVE A GREAT TOSSED SALAD OF EVENTS, WITH PLENTY OF RICH DAVIS VINEGAR TO MAKE IT TANGY.

THIS ONE IS NOT BE MISSED, ESPECIALLY THE CLOSING, WITH ITS SUGGESTION OF DARK VICTORY, BUT WITH NONE OF THE NICENESS OF THE LATTER FILM. SO, WATCH BETTE SMOKE UP A STORM, RIDE HORSES WITH HER ROMANTIC LOVER, TRY TO KILL MERRILL IN A JEEP, DO BAD THINGS TO HER HUSBAND, AND THEN FIND HERSELF IN A TERRIBLE FIX AT THE END.

WONDERFUL ACTING, FABULOUS GESTURES, AND EVERY SCENE IS BETTE...A GREAT PIECE OF FUN AND WILD FANCY.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A MUST FOR BETTE DAVIS DEVOTEES!
Review: "ANOTHER MAN'S POISON," DIRECTED BY IRVING RAPPER WHO GAVE YOU "NOW, VOYAGER, IS ABOUT AN AUTHORESS, BETTE DAVIS, WHO HAS TROUBLE WITH THE MEN IN HER LIFE. SHE HAS A HUSBAND WHO STANDS IN THE WAY OF A YOUNGER LOVER, AND THEN THERE'S GARY MERRILL, WITH EVIL INTENTIONS IN HIS HEART, WHO HAS HAD BAD DEALINGS WITH BETTE'S HUSBAND. BETTE KEEPS ALL THE BALLS IN THE AIR HERE, AND HAS WONDERFUL BITCHY ENCOUNTERS, VERY BITCHY ENCOUNTERS, WITH HER LOVER, WITH MERRILL, AND WITH HER HUSBAND. SHE STORMS AROUND THIS ENGLISH COTTAGE TALKING ABOUT HER HORSE THAT HAS BEEN KILLED, HER PET, AND HOW SHE WILL DEAL WITH THE MURDERER. ADD TO ALL THIS, POISON, THAT FINDS ITS WAY INTO BOTTLES AND FLASKS, AND WHATNOT, AND THROW IN A BODY AT THE BOTTOM OF A LAKE, AND A NOSY NEIGHBOR WHO SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE FIRST ONE KILLED, AND YOU HAVE A GREAT TOSSED SALAD OF EVENTS, WITH PLENTY OF RICH DAVIS VINEGAR TO MAKE IT TANGY.

THIS ONE IS NOT BE MISSED, ESPECIALLY THE CLOSING, WITH ITS SUGGESTION OF DARK VICTORY, BUT WITH NONE OF THE NICENESS OF THE LATTER FILM. SO, WATCH BETTE SMOKE UP A STORM, RIDE HORSES WITH HER ROMANTIC LOVER, TRY TO KILL MERRILL IN A JEEP, DO BAD THINGS TO HER HUSBAND, AND THEN FIND HERSELF IN A TERRIBLE FIX AT THE END.

WONDERFUL ACTING, FABULOUS GESTURES, AND EVERY SCENE IS BETTE...A GREAT PIECE OF FUN AND WILD FANCY.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Mediocre, disappointing
Review: Bette Davis, as we all know, is an American icon, a legendary American movie star, a great American movie actress, winner of multiple Academy Awards and many Academy Award nominations. But this doesn't mean that the acting of the feisty, volatile, tempestuous screen star was always good. She was at her best in the 1930s and 1940s (and in 1950's All About Eve). In some of her work in the 1950s, she lapsed into Bette Davis playing caricatures of Bette Davis, and this is one of those unfortunate occasions (an earlier one is her performance in Beyond the Forest, 1949).

The vehicle here is a dated, stagy melodrama which must have looked tired even in 1951, and must have appealed only as a showy vehicle for Davis. She stars here with her recent husband Gary Merrill, after their successful collaboration in All About Eve. Davis still seems to be playing the part of Margo Channing here; it's a very actressy performance. In addition to being over the top, she's over the hill for the part; she looks overweight and overripe (after all, she'd been making movies for 20 years at this point), hardly the femme fatale who could lure handsome young Anthony Steel away from his much more attractive young fiancee Barbara Murray.

Bette's overdone, actressy performance, replete with lots of eyeball rolling, cigarette lighting and smoking, and cocktail pouring and drinking, combined with a conventional performance from Merrill and the dated, stagy melodrama, cardboard characters, and obvious contrivances of this play, makes for an undistinguished film that is no credit to the Davis filmography. Even the cinematography (this is an independent British production) is bad; it's too dark and has the grainy look of an early TV kinescope. The only memorable feature is the polished performance of Emlyn Williams as an annoying busybody veterinarian constantly sticking his nose into his neighbors' business.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Mediocre, disappointing
Review: Bette Davis, as we all know, is an American icon, a legendary American movie star, a great American movie actress, winner of multiple Academy Awards and many Academy Award nominations. But this doesn't mean that the acting of the feisty, volatile, tempestuous screen star was always good. She was at her best in the 1930s and 1940s (and in 1950's All About Eve). In some of her work in the 1950s, she lapsed into Bette Davis playing caricatures of Bette Davis, and this is one of those unfortunate occasions (an earlier one is her performance in Beyond the Forest, 1949).

The vehicle here is a dated, stagy melodrama which must have looked tired even in 1951, and must have appealed only as a showy vehicle for Davis. She stars here with her recent husband Gary Merrill, after their successful collaboration in All About Eve. Davis still seems to be playing the part of Margo Channing here; it's a very actressy performance. In addition to being over the top, she's over the hill for the part; she looks overweight and overripe (after all, she'd been making movies for 20 years at this point), hardly the femme fatale who could lure handsome young Anthony Steel away from his much more attractive young fiancee Barbara Murray.

Bette's overdone, actressy performance, replete with lots of eyeball rolling, cigarette lighting and smoking, and cocktail pouring and drinking, combined with a conventional performance from Merrill and the dated, stagy melodrama, cardboard characters, and obvious contrivances of this play, makes for an undistinguished film that is no credit to the Davis filmography. Even the cinematography (this is an independent British production) is bad; it's too dark and has the grainy look of an early TV kinescope. The only memorable feature is the polished performance of Emlyn Williams as an annoying busybody veterinarian constantly sticking his nose into his neighbors' business.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: HIGH CAMP DAVIS
Review: Celebrated mystery writer Janet Frobisher (Davis) - who lives in a secluded mansion on the Yorkshire moors - is in love with Larry (Anthony Steele), a young engineer engaged to marry her secretary (Barbara Murray)..........It is fascinating watching Bette Davis, a superb screen actress if ever there was one, play everything in a blaze of breathtaking absurdity. The melodramatic gamut seldom has experienced the workout it is given in ANOTHER MAN'S POISON, a wild and fanciful saga where Davis, queen of the vixens, combs her hair, lights cartons of cigarettes, snaps her fingers and bites her consonants! No one has ever accused Davis of failing to rise to a good script; what this shows is how far she could go to meet a bad one. It's obvious that director Irving Rapper let Bette basically direct herself, for the same zealous overplaying isn't evident among the other cast members. Not to be missed by Davis fans! - it's safe to say that there are few things in the cinema quite like it. Based upon the play DEADLOCK by Leslie Sands, this little flick from 1952 was made in England and was, interestingly enough, produced by Douglas Fairbanks, Jr.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: DULL DAVIS? I'M AFRAID SO.....
Review: Dreary Davis vehicle which should never have been made. She's a famous authoress living in England who murders an inconvenient ex-husband. She's having it off with her secretary's boyfriend (who's much younger) and thinks she's pulled off the perfect crime (she's a mystery writer) until a former partner of the husband's shows up. He offers to cover for her but things get ridiculously out of hand and he kills her prize horse. This is not good. Then begins a game of wills that ends most ironically as Davis falls prey to her own schemes. She hams it up in this one and leaves no co-star unscathed. Murky b&w photography doesn't help either. It's slow and very stagy throughout. Her then husband Gary Merrill plays the partner and even he seems at a loss over how to cope with the script. If a Davis film can be called a total waste then this is it. Even she can't save it from sinking into tedious boredom. Stick with her other films instead and forget this turkey.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Routine Thriller Recommended Only for Bette Fans
Review: I'm happy that this movie has finally made it to video--I'd wanted to see it for years. However, the movie sounds more interesting than it actually is, and it is purely a routine production based on a routine story. The English actors conduct themselves nicely, but we've seen it all a hundred times before. Gary Merrill is actually bad most of the time, and his character grows tiresome mighty fast. Bette is Bette, and if you like her, you'll want to see ANOTHER MAN'S POISON. Get a load of her mad laugh toward the end!

Bubba

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Another Bette Davis Movie Video!
Review: ok.. this film is not very good... it is minor film in the career of Miss Bette Davis. BUT.. it is a fun film to view... too see how hard Miss Davis works to entertain her audience! Yes she overacts in this film... she has to... it storyline is bad...the direction is bad. See this film for the fun of it! You get to see her act with her then husband, Gary Merrill. Yes Miss Davis's character is a bad women... but nobody is as bad as Miss Davis when she is bad!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Another Bette Davis Movie Video!
Review: ok.. this film is not very good... it is minor film in the career of Miss Bette Davis. BUT.. it is a fun film to view... too see how hard Miss Davis works to entertain her audience! Yes she overacts in this film... she has to... it storyline is bad...the direction is bad. See this film for the fun of it! You get to see her act with her then husband, Gary Merrill. Yes Miss Davis's character is a bad women... but nobody is as bad as Miss Davis when she is bad!

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: AU REVOIR...
Review: Presented by Image, the 1952 ANOTHER MAN'S POISON directed by Irving Rapper and starring Bette Davis is a British production that curiously enters the DVD market before the major movies of the american star. Adapted by Val Guest from a play, the action takes place most of the time in the mansion of Bette Davis who plays a mystery writer living in beautiful english landscapes. She loves horseriding so we have the opportunity to admire the country every 20 minutes or so. When she doesn't ride, she is smoking, drinking or plotting the death of the man who has replaced her husband ; by the way, she has killed her real husband in the first three minutes of the movie.

The screenplay of ANOTHER MAN'S POISON is one of the most ridiculous I have seen in months but who cares after all, we are here for the Bette Davis show. And I must admit that the show is worth a look, the great lady giving a lesson of acting during 90 minutes. Gary Merrill plays the false husband with conviction but doesn't have the slightest chance against Bette Davis.

No subtitles but an extensive filmography of Bette Davis as extra-feature. Average to above-average sound and images.

A DVD zone Bette Davis ultra-hard fans.


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