What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice?

What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice?

Original promotional poster
Directed by Lee H. Katzin
Produced by Robert Aldrich
Written by Theodore Apstein
Ursula Curtiss (novel)
Starring Geraldine Page
Ruth Gordon
Music by Gerald Fried
Cinematography Joseph F. Biroc
Edited by Frank J. Urioste
Production
company
Palomar Pictures Corporation
The Associates & Aldrich Company
Distributed by Cinerama Releasing Corporation (1969, original)
MGM (2004, DVD)
Release date
  • July 23, 1969 (1969-07-23) (New York City)
  • August 20, 1969 (1969-08-20) (US)
Running time
 101 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $1,725,000[1]
Box office $3,225,000[1]

What Ever Happened to Aunt Alice? is a 1969 American thriller film directed by Lee H. Katzin with Bernard Girard (uncredited), and starring Geraldine Page, Ruth Gordon, Rosemary Forsyth, Robert Fuller and Mildred Dunnock. The screenplay by Theodore Apstein, based on the novel The Forbidden Garden by Ursula Curtiss focuses on an aging Arizona widow who hires elderly female housekeepers and cons them out of their money before murdering them.

The music score was by Gerald Fried and the cinematography by Joseph F. Biroc. The film was funded by American Broadcasting Company (ABC), Palomar Pictures Corporation, and The Associates & Aldrich Company, and distributed by Cinerama Releasing Corporation.

Plot

At her husband's funeral, Claire Marrable (Page) frantically removes flowers from her husband's coffin, while eerie music plays in the background. A few days later, Claire learns from the will that her husband made bad investments and left nothing to her except a briefcase, a butterfly collection and a stamp collection; his house, and the furnishings in it, do not belong to Claire. With nothing left, Claire moves into the home of her distant nephew in Tucson, Arizona.

In Tucson, Claire finds a penchant for successfully growing pine trees in the hot desert. The trees mark the graves of a string of live-in housekeepers whom Claire has murdered; we see her kill the fifth housekeeper, Miss Tinsley, after she asked about stocks she has purchased through Claire. Alice Dimmock (Gordon) arrives at the estate and investigates the Miss Tinsley's appearance under the guise of being Claire's newest housekeeper. After much intrigue and suspense, and three more murders, Claire is exposed and the enormous value of the stamp collection left to her is inadvertently revealed.

Cast

Production notes

The film is the third in a trilogy of Robert Aldrich-produced films (following What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) and Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) to feature two female leads. He directed the first two. All three films dealt with aged women who become scheming or demented, resorting to violence and murder.

It was shot on location in Tucson, Arizona, as well as at Aldrich Studios in Los Angeles, California.

Release and reception

The film earned rentals of $2,025,000 in North America and $1.2 million in other countries. After all costs were deducted, it recorded a loss of $860,000.[1]

In 2000, the film was released for the first time on DVD by Anchor Bay Entertainment, and again in 2004 by MGM, though both releases were discontinued.[2]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 "ABC's 5 Years of Film Production Profits & Losses", Variety, 31 May 1973 p 3
  2. ↑ "Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice?: Geraldine Page". Amazon.com. Retrieved 2014-05-10.
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