HARRIET CRAIG
B&W, 1950, 94 mins. 7 secs.
Directed by Vincent Sherman
Starring Joan Crawford, Wendell Corey, Lucille Watson, Allyn Joslyn, K.T. Stevens, William Bishop, Ellen Corby
Indicator (Blu-ray) (UK RB HD), TCM Vault, Sony (DVD) (US R1 NTSC)

QUEEN BEE
B&W, 1955, 94 mins. 40 secs.
Directed by Ranald MacDougall
Starring Joan Crawford, Barry Sullivan, Betsy Palmer, Lucy Marlow, Fay Wray
Indicator (Blu-ray) (UK RB HD), TCM Vault, Sony (DVD) (US R1 NTSC) / WS (1.85:1) (16:9)

After reinvigorating her career with a vengeance in her Oscar-winning role in the 1945 noir classic Mildred Pierce, Joan Crawford had found her niche in what would prove to be a cottage industry for the rest of her career. Even when she segued into horror films in the 1960s, they were still melodramas at heart with Crawford playing strong-willed career women being attacked on all sides. Though she had mainly made her name at Warner Bros., Crawford found welcome homes at other studios including an on-and-off relationship with Columbia Pictures that continued well into the 1960's with Strait-Jacket. Two of her vehicles from the '50s have been stuck in DVD limbo in the U.S., but in 2025 Indicator brought them to U.K. Blu-ray with plenty of extra goodies to help appreciate this pair of Crawford performances as a human wrecking ball in domestic American life.

First up is 1950's Harriet Craig made with director Vincent Sherman just after the same year's previous The Damned Don't Cry, also starring Crawford. The story here was a familiar one, based on the oft-performed 1925 play Craig's Wife which had already been filmed twice before (including a 1936 version with Rosalind Russell) and presented on radio multiple times. Married to the respected Walter Craig, Harriet (Crawford) is a materialistic and manipulative personality whose self-centered behavior includes the nasty mistreatment of the house's maids. She also uses deception to tamper with the love life of her younger cousin, Clare (Stevens), who lives with them in the house, and meddles in her husband's career to keep him under her thumb.

The timing of this film is fascinating given the postwar emphasis on the importance of nuclear families, suburban lifestyles, and upwardly mobile careers, all of which are depicted as tainted here right down to Harriet's deceptive claims that she can't have children. Of course, it's a role ideal for Crawford since her character's obsession with outward appearances means she gets to wear some astonishing outfits and run the entire gamut of dramatic emotions all the way to the end. Nobody else in the film comes even remotely close to seizing the spotlight, which means that Harriet/Joan is by far the most interesting person around in what could be seen as a scathing indictment of the subservient role women were expected to play at home all day.

Released on DVD several times including a standalone DVD-R from Sony and an entry in the TCM Vault's Joan Crawford in the 1950s set, Harriet Craig was long overdue for a Blu-ray release but proved to be worth the wait. (Hopefully the equally important Autumn Leaves won't be far behind.) The transfer supplied by Sony looks up to the studio's usual standards overall but comes from a rougher element than usual for them, with some damage evident on and off throughout (especially during the credits). The contrast is excellent though and does a reasonable job of approximating that silver nitrate luster, while the LPCM 1.0 English mono track is in fine shape and has improved English SDH subtitles. A new audio commentary with Glenn Kenny and Farran Smith Nehme runs through the major historical highlights and backgrounds associated with the film, though Nehme’s voice is faint and tinny-sounding which makes her tough to understand at times. Stick with it though as there's some fine insight into the film's function as an adaptation, its use of noir imagery, and the associations created by putting Crawford in the role. In “A World of Control” (18m31s), film historian Lies Lanckman discusses the making of the film and its place in Joan Crawford’s career at a point where the star was forging an identity as a strong-willed example of the American woman on screen. Next you get two earlier radio adaptations of the source play: 1940’s The Campbell Playhouse (44m3s) with Orson Welles and Ann Harding, and 1941’s Lux Radio Theatre (51m2s) with Rosalind Russell, Herbert Marshall, and Beulah Bondi. Also included are the theatrical trailer and a 73-image gallery, plus a 32-page booklet with a new essay by Pamela Hutchinson (“Don’t Try to Tell Me About Love”) about Crawford’s connections to the play and main character, her collaborations with Sherman while they were romantically involved, and the noir-inspired alterations to the source found in this film. A wild “A Studio Fair” collection of Crawford and Sherman interview and memoir highlights connected to the film is also included.

“You’re like some fancy kind of disease” is the memorable dialogue description given to Crawford's Eva Phillips, the titular Queen Bee in a much more outrageous story of a woman running roughshod over everyone around her. This time we head to Georgia where Eva has a loveless marriage to scarred Avery (Planet of the Vampires' Sullivan) and exerts cruelty over anyone in her circle including sister-in-law Carol (Friday the 13th's Palmer). In particular, Carol is planning to get hitched to Judson (I Saw What You Did's Ireland), a former flame of Eva's and Avery's business partner, something that Eva will never allow to happen. All of this is observed by new arrival Jennifer (Marlow), a family cousin staying at the Phillips household who soon gets dragged into Eva's horrific honeycomb of deceit. Soon past transgressions are coming to the surface, a body count begins, and more than one character is plotting murder.

Utterly overflowing with acidic dialogue, deranged plot turns, and more eye-popping outfits for Joan, this has long been a huge cult classic among the star's fans and got an enthusiastic write-up in the essential 1993 book, Bad Movies We Love. Of course, "bad" in this case means outrageous entertainment mounted with impeccable studio gloss which even earned it a couple of much-deserved Oscar nominations (for Jean Louis' costumes and Charles Lang's striking black-and-white cinematography). By this point 1.85:1 had become the standard U.S. aspect ratio for non-scope films, and that's how this has been presented on every home video format after its VHS release from RCA Columbia including a pressed DVD disc from Sony and its inclusion in that same TCM Crawford DVD set. Again it's tough to believe it's taken so long for Queen Bee to hit Blu-ray (especially with an HD option available for streaming purchase for years), but fans will be delighted to see it looking sparkling and quite impressive here with a nice scan from elements in perfect condition here. Again you get a crisp LPCM 1.0 mono English track with improved SDH subs, too. A new audio commentary by Little White Lies editor David Jenkins runs through the Southern attitudes and mannerisms here, snippets from Crawford biographies (unfortunately including the reprehensible Donald Spoto), the prevalence of “Joan on the phone” scenes and staircases in Crawford vehicles, and the intricacies of the character dynamics. In "A Sting in the Tale" (18m21s), Lanckman returns for another enjoyable chat about this period of independent stardom for Crawford, the star’s heavy involvement in every aspect of this film including working with the source novel’s author, and her relationships to the other actors. In "Fit for a Queen" (23m48s), Nathalie Morris explores the career of Parisian-born Hollywood costume designer Jean Louis, honing in on his work as head designers at Columbia Pictures and his impact on the looks of the studio’s films before he transitioned over to Universal. Also included are the spectacularly wonderful theatrical trailer, a 79-image gallery, a 31-image French photonovel, and an insert booklet with a new essay by the legendary Imogen Sara Smith ("Poisoned Honey") about the film's fusion of Southern gothic, camp, and noir, plus coverage of the film’s production from industry publications including comments by Crawford, author Edna Lee, and Columbia executive vice-president Abe Montague.

Reviewed on March 29, 2025