Directed by Bryan Forbes
Written by William Goldman from a novel by Ira Levin
1975/US
IMDb page
First viewing/YouTube
Bobbie Markowe: I can’t figure out this burg. It’s like maids have been declared illegal, and the housewife with the neatest place gets Robert Redford for Christmas. And believe me, if that’s the prize, I’d enter, but nobody’ll tell what the contest rules are. Cheers!
Well-done horror from the director of Seance on a Wet Afternoon and The Whisperers and the author of Rosemary’s Baby.
Joanna Eberhart (Katherine Ross) and her husband Walter (Peter Masterson), a lawyer, move to the charming, perfect little village of Stepford, Connecticut. It was Walter’s idea. Joanna was not too keen on this development as she loved living in New York City and the move interfered with her dreams of being a professional photographer. Walter is flattered to be asked to join the town’s Men’s Association and begins spending every evening with the “boys”
But it’s not only the town that is perfect. The men are of many ages and degrees of attractiveness. All the women are young, sexy, well-dressed, and made-up at all times. They spend their days keeping a perfect house and their nights pleasing their man.
This is not Joanna at all and she finds another newcomer wife, Bobbie (Paula Prentiss) who agrees. They try and fail at consciousness raising with the local women. Meanwhile, it becomes more apparent that the husbands are plotting something during their Men’s Association meetings and the story becomes increasingly dark and eerie and then downright terrifying. This is psychological horror with zero gore.
I enjoyed this. Evidently women’s liberation advocates criticized it for being misogynistic at the time. I thought it was a stong indictment against male chauvinism and all those commercials that were making us hate ourselves for leaving a ring around the guy’s collar. We’ve come a long way baby! Not a must-see but interesting.
I loved Paula Prentiss in this movie. If she’d been born 20 years earlier I think she would have been a huge star in screwball comedies. She’s wonderful in Howard Hawks’s last screwball comedy, MAN’S FAVORITE SPORT.
I love Paula Prentiss anytime. She’s also excellent in all those “where the boys are” movies with Jim Hutton.
One of my favorites is “What’s New Pussycat?” where Paula Prentiss holds her own with Romy Schneider, Ursula Andress and Capucine.
Unfortunately I haven’t seen that one.
This is a classic story, but I do not think I have seen this version. Is it worth seeking out?
I think you’d like it. It is much higher rated than the re-make which I haven’t seen. I thought the ending was genuinely scary. And there’s real suspense as to what will happen to some of the characters.
I agree with you on this. I don’t see this as a pro-chauvanism film, but a film that tries to show a sort of natural progression of chauvanist thought. And, of course, it has its roots in some classic stories–I won’t mention them specifically to avoid spoilers–that tie in with the deeper horror elements of this.
We’ll disagree on only one point–I think this one is required viewing.
I almost mentioned the film’s lineage in my review but decided against it to not spoil it.