My Top Ten Crazy Ladies In Movies

I love crazy ladies in movies! I was going to call this “Crazy Bitches” but didn’t want to get in trouble as people are so on edge about these sort of things nowadays. Actually, I could also be in trouble for using the word “crazy”, I suppose. I’m female so am I allowed to say “crazy bitch”?!

I feel like I should be offended when movies portray women as mentally unstable, especially when it’s over a “man”. But I’m not (well, okay – I’m a little offended by the “crazy ex-girlfriend” thing – the majority of us aren’t obsessed with men, believe it or not!). There are plenty of psychotic men in movies & no one seems to have any issues with that. Is it only okay for men to be psychos?

I have no issues with psychotic male or female characters – as long as the actor has fun with the role. The more over-the-top the better! I love when an actor clearly enjoys playing crazy & goes all out, like Jack Nicholson in The Shining or Kathy Bates in Misery. I have to say that I think it’s kind of funny that the term “bunny boiler” is so commonly used now, though. It just goes to show how great Glenn Close was in Fatal Attraction (written & directed by men). Women rarely get that crazy over men as far as I’m aware but it’s interesting that some guys think we might! 😉

Here are My Top Ten Crazy Ladies In Movies, counting down to my favorite:

10. Betsy Palmer as Mrs. Voorhees in Friday The 13th

9. Gloria Swanson as Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard

8. Samantha Eggar as Nola Carveth in The Brood

7. Jessica Walter as Evelyn in Play Misty For Me

6. Lara Flynn Boyle as Stacy in Wayne’s World

5. The Xenomorph Queen in Aliens

4. Kathy Bates as Annie Wilkes in Misery

3. Betty Lou Gerson as the voice of Cruella De Vil in 101 Dalmatians

2. Glenn Close as Alex Forrest in Fatal Attraction

1. Piper Laurie as Margaret White in Carrie

I’ve left SO many out. It was hard to choose only ten! So here’s a long list of honorable mentions (and I’ve still left a lot out):

Honorable Mentions:

– All the kick-ass ladies in Kill Bill
– Billie Whitelaw as Mrs. Baylock in The Omen
– Betty Davis as Baby Jane Hudson in What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?
– Marcia Gay Harden as Mrs. Carmody in The Mist
– Natalie Portman as Nina Sayers in Black Swan
– Fairuza Balk as Nancy Downs in The Craft
– Eleanor Audley as the voice of Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty
– Rosamund Pike as Amy Dunne in Gone Girl
– Essie Davis as Amelia in The Babadook
– Nicole Kidman as Grace Stewart in The Others
– Sharon Stone as Catherine Tramell in Basic Instinct
– Juliette Lewis as Mallory Knox in Natural Born Killers
– Jennifer Jason Leigh as Hedra Carlson in Single White Female
– Rebecca De Mornay as Peyton Flanders in The Hand That Rocks The Cradle
– Drew Barrymore as Ivy in Poison Ivy
– Elizabeth Taylor as Martha in Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?
– Kate Winslet as Juliet Hulme & Melanie Lynskey as Pauline Parker in Heavenly Creatures
– Margot Kidder as Danielle in Sisters
– Deanna Dunagan as Nana in The Visit
– Anthony Perkins in Psycho…

A Few I’ve Not Seen:
Audition
Mommie Dearest
Switchblade Romance
Suicide Squad

And here’s a shoutout to Crazy TV Ladies, including most of the females in Game Of Thrones! Love those Game Of Thrones gals.

Let’s end this with Taylor Swift’s video for Blank Space… 😉

I bet no one who knows my taste in music ever thought they’d see a Taylor Swift video on my blog! It just felt like the right video to end this post. To be fair to Swift, it’s cool that she had fun with the media’s unfair image of her.

You can read a great article about the portrayal of women as “crazy” & the sexist double standards that still exist in Hollywood (and in real life) HERE at dailydot.com. It starts out about Swift but then gets into detail about the history of the sexist treatment of famous women.

Disney Movies Reimagined As Tim Burton Films

Tim Burton (back when he was still making good movies) crossed with Disney?! Yes, please! These Tim-Burton-style Disney posters are from illustrator Andrew Tarusov. Love ’em! I’m posting a few of my favorites but you can see the rest HERE. 🙂

101 Dalmatians (1996) Guest Review

This review for the John Hughes Blogathon comes from Rae of Fearsome 5 (& family!). Thanks for being a part of this blogathon, Rae! Let’s see what she thinks of 101 Dalmatians… 🙂

I’m so excited to be participating in the John Hughes Blogathon! I hate to admit (since this month is all about him!) I got on the Hughes train a little bit late. Better late than never right. Anyway, 101 Dalmatians, for which he did the screenplay, was definitely a favorite when I was younger and didn’t disappoint while watching again years later.

To start…this film is full of familiar faces: Glenn Close, Jeff Daniels, Joely Richardson, Joan Plowright, and Hugh Laurie. I felt they did a believable job playing the characters, which could be hard to do since almost everyone has seen the cartoon. It’s hard not to think about the cartoon while watching this, but this movie was really good in itself!

In case anyone doesn’t know, this movie is about a crazy, wild fashonista that kidnaps a crapload of dogs for the sole purpose of making a fur coat.
Glenn Close was creepy good as Cruella De Vil. Some of the silhouette shots of her laughing were spot on and oh so evil! She did great bringing one of my favorite villains to life. I mean, look at this lady…

(Yikes! The hair totally reminds me of Edward Scissorhands…and also my hair on most days 😉 )

I was also surprised at how well the film works with real (and some animated/computer) animals. They were so well trained and seemed to convey emotion so well…how do they do that?! A lot of the film has no dialogue, just barking and animals running around, but it works. And they’re so cute J I was looking up pictures on IMDb and saw that 203 Dalmatian puppies and 20 adults were used for this film. After watching, I wish I could adopt about 20.

I’m not super big into slapstick comedy, and this movie had a lot of it. I’m guessing kids would probably love that though. At times, it felt sort of like watching Home Alone but with animals instead of Macaulay Culkin.

Some other interesting facts about this movie…

The actors had steak juice rubbed on their skin so the dogs would lick them. And Jeff Daniels had hot dogs rubbed all over his face to get shots like this.

And, back to John Hughes, apparently he made more money from 101 Dalmatians than any other movie due to a piece of merchandising profits in his contract. (from IMDB)

All in all, this movie was a lot of fun! I enjoyed watching it again now almost as much as I did when I was younger. This is one the whole family could enjoy.

Thanks to Table 9 Mutant for hosting and to everyone for all the fun reviews-I love reading them all!!