This film presents something of a dilemma for me. It stars my favorite actress Susan Hayward so I'm already favorably disposed. But she's in a remake in a role made famous by another screen icon, Bette Davis and it's a part that I gave the highest rating possible for. It is in fact my favorite Bette Davis film.
No home run for Susan, but a nice and more than respectable triple for Stolen Hours which is an updated remake of Dark Victory. This film is also relocated from the Long Island horsey set to swinging London of the Sixties.
Hayward plays the heiress who's erratic behavior has got boyfriend Edward Judd who is in the racecar driving business all kinds of concerned. He calls in famed neurosurgeon Michael Craig who with a reluctant Hayward diagnoses her brain tumor.
If you've seen Dark Victory you know how this all turns out. Hayward successfully puts her own individuality on the tragic role. Her Laura Pember is older than Bette's Judith Traherne, this is a woman who has lived longer and with more excess than Davis did in Dark Victory.
Two ironic things about Stolen Hours. First Susan Hayward's next film would be When Love Has Gone and she would be daughter and mother with Bette Davis. Not the best film for either of them, still it's a one time only to see two of the very best ever working together.
And as her legion of fans know Susan Hayward eventually died of a brain tumor. One can hope that life imitated art and her death resembled what she portrays here.
It's not Dark Victory, but Susan Hayward comes home with a winner in Stolen Hours.
No home run for Susan, but a nice and more than respectable triple for Stolen Hours which is an updated remake of Dark Victory. This film is also relocated from the Long Island horsey set to swinging London of the Sixties.
Hayward plays the heiress who's erratic behavior has got boyfriend Edward Judd who is in the racecar driving business all kinds of concerned. He calls in famed neurosurgeon Michael Craig who with a reluctant Hayward diagnoses her brain tumor.
If you've seen Dark Victory you know how this all turns out. Hayward successfully puts her own individuality on the tragic role. Her Laura Pember is older than Bette's Judith Traherne, this is a woman who has lived longer and with more excess than Davis did in Dark Victory.
Two ironic things about Stolen Hours. First Susan Hayward's next film would be When Love Has Gone and she would be daughter and mother with Bette Davis. Not the best film for either of them, still it's a one time only to see two of the very best ever working together.
And as her legion of fans know Susan Hayward eventually died of a brain tumor. One can hope that life imitated art and her death resembled what she portrays here.
It's not Dark Victory, but Susan Hayward comes home with a winner in Stolen Hours.