A Film Canon

This extraordinary film distinguishes two types of fandom - contemplative and iterative - and pathologises the latter, turning on the relationship between aging theatrical diva Margo Channing (Bette Davis) and aspiring actress Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter), all of whose gestures of appreciation (including attendance at every performance of one of Margo's plays) gradually reveal themselves as so many attempts to study, memorise and ultimately become her. This produces one of the most chilling cinematic psychopaths to date, especially since Margo's own lurid egotism temporarily eclipses Eve's ambitions, and even, at times, seems to be exactly what precludes them - the paradox of justified paranoia - while Baxter's relatively one-dimensional acting (at least compared to Davis) imbues her with the character of a representative sample that, in combination with the cyclical implications of the conclusion, suggests that such iteration may be endemic to the theatrical and cinematic universe (the film ends with Eve heading for Hollywood); or, alternatively, that every contemplative fan masks an iterative fan, and every gesture of theatrical appreciation is simultaneously one of envy: "We're a breed apart from the rest of humanity, we theatre folk...we're the original displaced persons". Hence Mankiewicz's ingenious coercion of the narrative in the direction of Davis' most iterative fan base - gay men - condensing her grotesqueries and idiosyncrasies into a delightfully camp performance that nevertheless undermines itself, simultaneously providing and withholding the viewer's temptation to ape her mannerisms, and producing an exquisitely ironic tone.