The abusive and traumatic adoptive upbringing of Christina Crawford at the hands of her mother, screen queen Joan Crawford, is depicted.The abusive and traumatic adoptive upbringing of Christina Crawford at the hands of her mother, screen queen Joan Crawford, is depicted.The abusive and traumatic adoptive upbringing of Christina Crawford at the hands of her mother, screen queen Joan Crawford, is depicted.
- Awards
- 9 wins & 11 nominations
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaFaye Dunaway mentions in her autobiography that she screamed herself hoarse during the filming for the notorious wire hanger tantrum scene in this movie. She called Frank Sinatra for help, and he gave her some pointers on how to get her voice back into shape.
- GoofsWhen Joan Crawford substitutes for her daughter on a soap opera, producer of show gives her a pep talk during a commercial, indicating it was a live broadcast. In reality 'The Secret Storm' was taped and director later said Crawford's performance was so poor he had to patch it together in editing room. Although it was recorded, The Secret Storm was "live tape", meaning that it was treated as if it were a live broadcast. At the end of each act, the actors stopped for the exact length of the commercials and then resumed taping.
- Quotes
[addressing the men in the Pepsi boardroom]
Joan Crawford: Don't fuck with me fellas. This ain't my first time at the rodeo.
- Alternate versionsDue to the damage on the film's master, all current video/television prints are missing the dramatic music as Joan destroys her rose garden.
- SoundtracksI'm Sitting On Top Of The World
by Sam Lewis, Joe Young (as Young) & Ray Henderson (as Henderson)
Featured review
Alright, this might not be too obscure of a movie but when it came out it wasn't well received and pretty much ignored causing it to have a huge cult following. The acting by Dunaway as Joan Crawford is so exaggerated that it seems unbelievable that it's a biographical tale. More than Crawford's story as an actress, this movie deals with the painful, abusive, and traumatic upbringing of her daughter Christina (she wrote the book that prompted the making of this movie). Some say Christina made a lot of it up to destroy her mother's reputation but others say it might be quite accurate. Either way, Dunaway's performance as the Screen Queen is uncanny. She embodies every quality of Crawford and watching the movie you forget that it's not really Joan but Faye in the role. Sure, this movie won Razzie Awards and the producers even tried to capitalize with its failure by billing it "The worst mother of them all." Dunaway even goes as far as telling interviewers beforehand that she will not talk about this movie. One can understand her seeing that she was campaigning for an Oscar nod and instead won the Razzie for worst actress but none of that matters because this movie is now seen as a great tragedy and you'll definitely get lost in the story wondering if everything is true. Oh, and the scenes with Faye Dunaway and Mara Hobel, who plays young Christina Crawford, are amazing. It's no wonder she won the Young Artist Award. Seriously, watch it. The "No more wire hangers" scene alone is enough to watch this great film.
- alex54ruiz
- Jan 24, 2011
- Permalink
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Meine liebe Rabenmutter
- Filming locations
- 355 S. Mapleton Drive, Holmby Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA(pool-area and rear of Joan Crawford's house, demolished)
- Production company
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $5,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $19,032,261
- Gross worldwide
- $19,034,156
- Runtime2 hours 9 minutes
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content