It's NOT about the rise of a movie queen, instead Paddy Chayefsky's THE GODDESS is a grueling experience showing the disintegration of a woman into madness. Kim Stanley stars (not always convincingly) as a small-town girl who goes to Hollywoood and becomes a star, all the while being a complete lunatic. Is it the role or is it Stanley? The actress emotes and emotes and acts and acts until the viewer is just completely exhausted. Your stamina will really be tested watching this. Chayefsky's script is alternately touching and laughable. There is a very sad scene in which the title character (played as child by a very young Patty Duke) informs her cat that she's been promoted at school. Unfortunately there's far too many explosions of self-loathing by not only Stanley, but by Stephen Hill and Lloyd Bridges (as her first and second husbands respectively). Hill is saddled with quoting a lot of poets to show us he's "sensitive." There are a few terrific supporting performances; one by Betty Lou Holland as Stanley's religious fanatic mother and one by Elizabeth Wilson as a pushy caregiver. Directed, unimaginatively, by John Cromwell.
Review of The Goddess
