What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice?

What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice?

Original promotional poster
Directed by Lee H. Katzin
Produced by Robert Aldrich
Written by Theodore Apstein
Ursula Curtiss (novel)
Starring Geraldine Page
Ruth Gordon
Music by Gerald Fried
Cinematography Joseph F. Biroc
Edited by Frank J. Urioste
Production
company
Palomar Pictures Corporation
The Associates & Aldrich Company
Distributed by Cinerama Releasing Corporation (1969, original)
MGM (2004, DVD)
Release dates
  • July 23, 1969 (1969-07-23) (New York City)
  • August 20, 1969 (1969-08-20) (US)
Running time
 101 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $1,725,000[1]
Box office $3,225,000[1]

What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? is a 1969 American thriller film directed by Lee H. Katzin with Bernard Girard (uncredited), and starring Geraldine Page, Ruth Gordon, Rosemary Forsyth, Robert Fuller and Mildred Dunnock. The screenplay by Theodore Apstein, based on the novel The Forbidden Garden by Ursula Curtiss focuses on an aging Arizona widow who hires elderly female housekeepers and cons them out of their money before murdering them.

The music score was by Gerald Fried and the cinematography by Joseph F. Biroc. The film was funded by American Broadcasting Company (ABC), Palomar Pictures Corporation, and The Associates & Aldrich Company, and distributed by Cinerama Releasing Corporation.

Plot

The opening scene of the film sets the tone. Claire Marrable (Page) is recently widowed and at the funeral, she frantically removes flowers from her husband's coffin, while eerie music plays in the background. A few days later, her husband's will is revealed by the junior partner of a law firm (The Bob Newhart Show's Peter Bonerz, in one of his first roles): her husband made bad investments and left nothing to her except a briefcase, a butterfly collection and a stamp collection. The home itself, and the furnishings in it, do not belong to Claire Marrable. Marrable goes ballistic, smashing the butterfly collection to smithereens and then tearfully frets about what lies in her future. At the lawyer's prodding, she remembers that she has a distant nephew in Arizona.

Forward a few months: Marrable is comfortably ensconced in a ranch home outside Tucson, Arizona. We had seen her murder what we later understand to be one of her housekeepers/companion. She has a penchant for successfully growing pine trees, even out in the hot desert. She lives with a housekeeper, Miss Tinsley (Dunnock). One evening, Miss Tinsley asks Marrable for an update on the stocks she has purchased through Marrable; this upsets Marrable, who threatens immediately to sell the stocks, even at a loss, to rid herself, and the housekeeper, of the anxiety. Upon arrival of a new pine tree from a nursery, Marrable demands that Miss Tinsley go out in the cool night to help her plant the tree. When the two women arrive at the recently dug hole for the tree, Marrable claims her watch has fallen in the hole and asks Miss Tinsley to jump in the hole to retrieve it. When the housekeeper searches for the watch, Marrable grabs a shovel and whacks the housekeeper over the head, then buries her in the hole, using the pine tree as a testament to her latest conquest. We then see five pine trees, in varying size in a long shot of the garden, each in different stages of growth, suggesting this process has been repeated.

Alice Dimmock (Gordon) appears and wins the position of sixth companion, serving Mrs. Marrable well and to her employer's liking, but, in fact, Dimmock is in reality investigating the disappearance of the last victim whom we learn had been Dimmock's own companion. After much intrigue and suspense, another murder is committed, atypical of the previous, plus two more attempted murders, until finally Mrs. Marrable's guilt is exposed, and the enormous value of the stamp collection left to her by her dead husband is inadvertently revealed.

Cast

Production notes

The film is the third in a trilogy of Robert Aldrich-produced films (following What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) and Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) to feature two female leads. He directed the first two. All three films dealt with aged women who become scheming or demented, resorting to violence and murder.

It was shot on location in Tucson, Arizona, as well as at Aldrich Studios in Los Angeles, California.

Release and reception

The film earned rentals of $2,025,000 in North America and $1.2 million in other countries. After all costs were deducted, it recorded a loss of $860,000.[1]

In 2000, the film was released for the first time on DVD by Anchor Bay Entertainment, and again in 2004 by MGM, though both releases were discontinued.[2]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 "ABC's 5 Years of Film Production Profits & Losses", Variety, 31 May 1973 p 3
  2. ↑ "Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice?: Geraldine Page". Amazon.com. Retrieved 2014-05-10.

External links

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