The Bad Seed (1956) 7.3
A housewife suspects that her seemingly perfect 8-year-old daughter is a heartless killer. Director:Mervyn LeRoy |
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The Bad Seed (1956) 7.3
A housewife suspects that her seemingly perfect 8-year-old daughter is a heartless killer. Director:Mervyn LeRoy |
|
| Watch Trailer 0Share... |
| Complete credited cast: | |||
| Nancy Kelly | ... | ||
| Patty McCormack | ... | ||
| Henry Jones | ... | ||
| Eileen Heckart | ... | ||
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Evelyn Varden | ... | |
| William Hopper | ... |
Col. Kenneth Penmark
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| Paul Fix | ... | ||
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Jesse White | ... |
Emory Wages
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Gage Clarke | ... |
Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker
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Joan Croydon | ... |
Claudia Fern
(as Joan Croyden)
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| Frank Cady | ... |
Henry Daigle
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Christine Penmark seems to have it all: a lovely home, a loving husband and the most "perfect" daughter in the world. But since childhood, Christine has suffered from the most terrible recurring nightmare. And her "perfect" daughter's accomplishments include lying, theft and possibly much, much worse. Only Christine knows the truth about her daughter and only Christine's father knows the truth about her nightmare. Written by A.L.Beneteau <albl@inforamp.net>
As the closing statement says, "This motion picture presents a premise that is daringly different."
It may seem to be a self-indulgent thing to say, but in 1956, a film about an angelic looking child named Rhoda Penmark (the remarkable Patty McCormack, whose performance is absolutely brilliant, vicious, and mercurial...she transforms with ease from a sweetie-pie to a bristling monster and back to a sweetie-pie), complete with cutesy dresses, disarming curtsies, and blonde braids, who in fact is a homicidal, amoral murderer, was indeed "daringly different". After the generation of Shirley Temple's angelic dresses and bouncy curles and darling dimples, the idea of a perfectly beautiful little girl being a chillingly cold killer is unnerving to say the least. I love this movie, the controversy surrounding its theme: is a murderous personality inherited???
The book HIDEAWAY by Dean Koontz may have been inspired by this classic B&W film. Koontz describes the malefactor in that book in much the same way little Rhoda is contemplated in this film. Something missing in their genetic codes. "The fundementals of nucleotides, DNA proteins..."
As in HIDEAWAY, where the reader was shocked to discover that Vassago's grandpa was a maniac who slaughtered his family, we discover in THE BAD SEED that there was a grandmother back in Christine's (Nancy Kelly) family who methodically murdered her own brood and then calmly left the country, never to be heard from again.
Just the sight of little Rhoda in that infamous scene with the ex-con/yardman LeRoy is enough to have your hair standing on end: "YOU GIVE ME MY SHOES!!! THEY'RE MINE!!! GIVE THEM TO ME NOW, LEROY!!! RIGHT HERE TO ME!!!" Ooh!!! {{{Shiver}}}!!! That is one nasty little seed, that is!!! And not one any sensible person would dare mess with. Poor LeRoy learns this the hard way.
Not a film for the easily upset or faintish. It's not a horror movie, but laden with truly horrific scenes. The "daringly different" premise is brilliant and far ahead of its time of the sweet, Mrs. Cleaver 1950s.
A+