The Anniversary (1968)

Trust Hammer to make one of their most ghastly movies a black comedy with not a trace of horror in sight. This entire production is centred around a ghoulish performance from a barnstorming Bette Davis as the matriarch of a rich family. The family are brought together to celebrate the wedding anniversary between Davis and her late husband, and as the night goes on everybody's dark secrets are gradually revealed with skeletons dropping out of closets all over the place.Roy Ward Baker's superior direction keeps what is in essence a single location film moving along nicely. This would have worked well as a stage play as for 90% of the running time we get Davis going around and dominating the screen in being absolutely horrible to everybody. As such, few of the other cast members get much of a look in, but nobody puts a foot wrong here. There are many genuinely funny moments throughout, particularly in Davis's put-downs, and a darkness of touch which is surprising given that this is a family friendly production.

If you are looking to see Bette Davis at her diabolical best later on in her career, look no further. Davis plays the satanic matriarch of a less than perfect family - gathered together for the anniversary of her deceased husband. Davis does a marvellous job of portraying a bitter mother that take pleasure in toying with the lives of her sons, and by proxy, their wives. Watching Davis poke and swipe at her sons and daughter in-laws is akin to watching a cat stalk a bird. This movie is mean, punchy, hilarious and even cloying at times, but definitely worth the watch. You will laugh, you will be angered, you will be shocked. Another Hammer classic. Hope to see this released on Blu-ray soon.

This film adapts one of those "family members at each others' throats" stage plays. One can compare it with "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" - but it doesn't have the tragic depth that "Woolf" has. But it's enjoyable on a sort of cathartic level. Most of us have, I think, had to stifle many unpleasant and devastating (so we imagine they would be) insults, verbal attacks, and nastier pranks and threats that we imagine hurling at our family members in response to their perceived offenses against us, which we cannot launch because we are too decent or too inhibited to do so. Well, none of these characters are; in particular, the matriarch, Mrs. Taggart, played by Bette Davis as sort of a cousin of the Snow Queen in Narnia, but with much more of a sense that she is enjoying herself immensely. Really I think Davis was consciously trying to set a benchmark against which all other narcissistic tyrant moms in the later history of the cinema must be compared.Mrs. Taggart has not so much raised as trained her three now-adult sons to play the roles she wants them to play in her construction business and in the family. I use the word "trained" in the animal- training sense, or perhaps in the sense one uses to describe the way that ivy is induced to grow on a trellis, or bonsai trees are constrained to grow in a little twisted way. Today they come to the house, per annual ritual, in observance of the anniversary of her marriage to her long-deceased husband. But it is just another way of it being "her day". As if any of the other days of the year belonged anyone else in the family.One has brought his wife, and another a new fiancée, who may be of help in plans or fantasies of escape or rebellion. The eldest son is unmarried, subject to "perversion" - this 1968 portrayal is far from what we would want written today, and yet the ways he chooses to enact his preferences are so risky and transgressive that they make me wonder if on some level he isn't trying to go to prison to get away from Mother.The thing that makes this farce rather than tragedy, I think, is that the level of witty verbal bloodshed is so extreme that we are spared the duty of suspension of disbelief. We don't believe that this is a movie about real people with a history. It is more like a Punch and Judy show, or like some "Twilight Zone" episodes you can think of with twisted patriarchs. And that in turn puts us off from wondering how it is that after years of this nobody has actually left. Anyway, I don't think this movie actually leaves us with a lot of new wisdom about dysfunctional families, but not every movie has to be a classic in that sense. It does what it is trying to do very well.

Quite simply, Bette Davis dominates every scene and every aspect of The Anniversary. If you don't like Bette Davis, you'd be wise to skip this one altogether. Davis plays Mrs. Taggart, the overbearing mother to three sons. She controls every aspect of their lives. They cannot make a move without her approval. And if she doesn't approve, she's not above ruining one of her sons if it suits her selfish purposes. The Anniversary covers the events surrounding the annual celebration of Mrs. Taggart's wedding anniversary to the late Mr. Taggart. It's Mrs. Taggart's day and she lets everyone know it. She uses this event to cement her control over her sons by threatening financial ruin, jail, and/or public humiliation and by degrading them and their significant others.Bette Davis is in fine form in The Anniversary. She's evil, vindictive, manipulative, and a ton of fun. She chews scenery like nobody's business. The rest of the cast is good, but they are no match for Ms. Davis. Some of the comments she makes to her youngest son's new fiancé are unbelievable. One of the best is when she quite casually tells the girl, "My dear, would you mind sitting somewhere else? Body odor offends me." Another priceless example is Mrs. Taggart's reaction to the frightened fiancé when she discovers Mrs. Taggart's glass eye in her bed. I don't know of many actresses who could pull-off being so rude and just plain evil and still have the viewer rooting for them.Hammer Studios made this incredibly black comedy during the 60s when a lot of aging female stars were taking roles in horror movies. The Anniversary may not be a horror film, but it's certainly not the norm you would expect for someone like Bette Davis. I don't know how The Anniversary did financially upon release, but it's the kind of movie I would have liked to have seen Hammer making more of in the late 60, early 70s. Who knows? It might have saved the company.