The Little Foxes [DVD]

William Wyler weaves a tapestry of nefarious enchantment, depicting the story of a ruthless and scheming family who will stop at nothing to achieve their avaricious goals, which includes sacrificing one or all of their own kith and kin.This is perhaps Bette Davis's finest roles, although that assessment is purely subjective, depicting a woman wielding her ambition like the proverbial Sword of Damocles, threatening to destroy any obstacle that stands in her way.She is the Queen on the chessboard of life's struggles, who employs her cunning stealth to reduce her peers and superiors alike to the roll of pawns.Her brothers may be the King and Castle but even their combined stratagems cannot protect them forever from the threat of achieving nothing more than a stalemate which provides all parties with an opportunity begin a new game.Thus it is with Regina, her husband and her two brothers, one of whom is married to a hapless wife who can only stand by as a witness to the Machiavellian schemes of the other four principle characters.Regina is a disinherited woman who benefits from a marriage of comfortable convenience but must work within the confines of an unyielding patriarchal society in order to take what is rightfully hers; unfortunately her utter lack of any sense of moral obligation prevents her from being perceived as wronged woman with commendable ideals; that notion doesn't even exist in her sphere of self serving reality.Her two brothers are the Scrooge and Marley who will sell their souls if the Devil himself could indeed be manifested.The pivotal players are reduced to three after Regina's husband played by Herbert Marshall is murdered by the intentional and unspoken refusal of aid from his wife to retrieve his medication at a critical life threatening moment. This is the defining scene that cements Regina's personae as a woman bereft of any sense of conscience.It's at this point that the opposing plots of Regina and her two brothers Benjamin and Oscar played respectively by Charles Dingle and Carl Benton Reid come to a head.As a side note, the portrayal of Regina's daughter and the elopement with her betrothed is of no consequence.This is an abhorrently ugly and convincing story of humanity at its' worst that is all too real and has manifested itself in Mephistophelian like horror since antiquity.

great acting, and a window on the mores and attitudes and social conditions of the time the movie was made, 1941, and its vision of the Deep South at the turn of the century (20th), concerning race, gender and capitalism. A female character represents the old landed, Southern aristocrat as kindly, naive, and exploited by the new capitalist southerner, kind of a Blanche Dubois character in her deludedness, but it seems as if the film auteurs do expect us to share that vision of a kindly, non-exploitative slave owning aristocracy, which had been heavily propagandized since the termination of Reconstruction. The movie shows black characters in predictable, and "incorrect" ways, but also in an admirable light. There us a set scene in the beginning of rather poor lookingblack homes and clothes watching, and along coming a crippled, older black man, poorly dressed. There is fawning, chin rubbing, head scratching and grinning, and happy go lucky interjecting. And on the buggy ride into town with the extremely competent, well-spoken, well-kempt black female factotum, with the teenage daughter of betty davis's character, only the black laborers moving bales of cotton doft their hats to them. What we see are the black characters, (minor characters and extras mostly), doing all the work and making everything go. Whites work in the bank, and scheme in their parlors on how to enrich themselves further. Indeed, it is the black female factotum who enforces, or seeks to enforce, the social graces and mores governing relations between male and female, proper female behavior, charity and religious piety. Although the drama involves only the white characters, her character gets more lines and screen time than some of the major white characters. Davis plays a woman with a commanding understanding of just how she's been cheated as a woman from playing a prominent role in life, and she's determined not to take it any longer. Her daughter finds herself being encouraged to think for herself, travel alone, take command of her invalid father, and in the end, to reject the cynicism and greed of her mother and uncles, the "New South"'s capitalist oppressors. This film presages the rekindling of a Women's Rights Movement to come in the 60's, and in a backhanded way, the need for a new Civil Rights movement to pick up from the point where Reconstruction was dismantled and the United States as a whole became propagandized by Southern White Supremacists.

This adaptation of the play by Lilian Hellman was a star vehicle for Bette Davis, a third time collaboration with director William Wyler with whom she subsequently fell out. Davis and her two brothers represent the scheming, grasping Hubbard clan. Davis' character, Regina, has been forced to play the 'little woman' while her brothers purely by virtue of their sex have all the family money and run the family business. This is unfortunate as Regina is easily the coolest, cleverest and most unscrupulous of the three but she has plans and she intends to make everybody pay. Its a great and natural role for Davis who looks superb and acts the bitch to the manor born. I believe that she decided to cut out the more sympathetic side of Regina's character in order to contrast with Tallulah Bankhead's portrayal in the Broadway play but there are still hints at a softer side to Regina even in Davis' portrayal and one can see what has driven her to her chosen path. Her two brothers and nephew are painted in broader strokes and are less interesting as a result. Herbert Marshall is good as Regina's sickly, principled (and slightly irritating) husband, Horace. As their daughter Alexandra, Teresa Wright had her screen debut. I have liked Wright very much in other movies but here she plays a fairly standard sweet but dumb girl. I did like Richard Carlson as her love interest, David but the best performance (other than Davis) for me was Patricia Collinge as the sympathetic Birdie, abused wife of Regina's younger brother. She was perfect as this sweet woman used from the start by her husband and then despised and abandoned by both him and her own son - heart wrenching!I enjoyed 'The Little Foxes' although its probably not my favourite of Davis' early films. That might be 'Now Voyager'!

I have always loved this film,the acting is great.the one thing is that it is not PC as it is a different time and era.

This is the film that Bette Davis was born to star in. Here she is - conniving, brutal, vain, imperious and grasping. Just the sort of character we should all love to hate, but yet love.The story concerns a money-spinning deal, and unfortunately the only possible investor for the deal is not interested in doing so. I won't ruin the plot, but shall only say that the goings-on that follow will have you gasping and on the edge of your seat. Quite brilliant performances all round, astute dialogue and beautifully crafted cinematography. This is the film that Bette Davis ought to have won an Oscar for (instead it went to Joan Fontaine in "Suspicion"), and this is the film that Hollywood should continue to aspire to.

This is a Bette Davis film that I have always wanted on DVD. For a long time it was only available as region one - which is no good to me. She is a utterly ruthless and cold woman here. The role was made for her. The scene where she watches her husband die chills the blood. Years ago these films were often shown on tv, BBC2 used to do seasons of Bette Davis films. When I had a video recorder I had a field day! They are never shown now, and until recently many of them were not obtainable in region 2 format. This is a Korean import, it plays in English. I also have the Korean import of Jezebel, another cracking Bette Davis film. This is well worth having; Bette Davis in viperish form.

Another fantastic film and performance from Miss Bette Davis in the Starring role,she the sister,and her two brothers try to do a business deal with her husband and fails