To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

Spoilers ahead. Some observations. Bette one tough cookie. Miriam shrewish, selfish, spoiled. Grownup Tina charming, unselfish, unspoiled. How horrible to watch another woman raise one's child. How even more horrible to hear that other woman constantly remind of all the financial and emotional support for the child, while the biological mother has to sit in the background and constantly eat all of that crow. I'll get you, Miriam, someday I'll really get your sorry posterior. Or so we hope. What is good for the child? Her father is gone. She is the offspring of Miriam's rejected old flame. Bette did actually get that accomplished. If there had been birth control back then as we know it today, perhaps there would have been no story. But alas!!! The utter shame, back then, of illegitimacy. Now, it's all Baby Daddy and Baby Mama, which is happening a lot these days. George Brent was not able to say, "Whoops, Bette, gotta go to the pharmacy and get something to prevent making babies."Older Bette had too much white hair to be the believable mother of older Tina. The Old Maid look was certainly stereotyped in this film. 1939. Another American Civil War theme. GWTW, anyone? 10/10.

Two women, and a secret. Two actresses giving superb performances. Two stories wrapped up as one - one, about the cruelty of social conventions; the other, the personal relations twisted by those social conventions. The truth is concealed and people suffer. Pretense becomes the rule and feelings are suppressed. Bette Davis plays Charlotte, a woman who is forced to live a lie and as a result becomes a caricature of someone she is not. Mariam Hopkins plays Charlotte's cousin and closest confidante, Delia, who conspires with Charlotte to conceal the awful truth that could mean disgrace for the entire family. This movie succeeds in telling a compelling and dramatic story that deals with many relevant social themes: family roles, social conventionality, deceitfulness, and honor. It also deals with the role of truthfulness in a society in which the truth can be used as a weapon to destroy. Technically, this movie is flawless. George Brent has a small but significant role as the gentleman involved in both women's lives. This movie offers solid drama that is thought provoking and entertaining. Hence, this movie is well worth watching.

You'll notice right off towards the last part of this film the resemblance Bette Davis has to her Now Voyager character. Along with the similar storyline.Now this one isn't the same as Voyager but it has very similar themes. The character who doesn't get married for various reasons. The "Old Maid" quality in the main character. This doesn't get the praise Voyager does but it stands on its own quite easily.I have quite a few little complaints but they're minor ones. I think first and foremost...How does any mother continually let her sister take all the credit for her being her child's real mother? I think most might say well...it was the times. I don't buy that. I think for this film they amp up the melodrama to the point where it's like...gimme a break. Another thing I don't get is how the doctor in this. He's the only one who knows whose the baby's really mother is and in the time span this film is suppose to cover...he doesn't age a cent. LOL he looks the same 20 years before. Lastly, what really irks me is how, close to end, they blame Charlotte for being a crone all these years and how difficult she's been to live with. I mean the sister badgers her endlessly into making sure no-one knows who the real mother is. How would any girl feel if someone took over her child's life? For me, with the minor quibbles, this was a good film. Another Bette Davis winner fer sure. Other than, IMO, the weak ending it succeeded in it's job. To entertain me for an hour and a half.

If anyone knows which of Edith Wharton's novels was made into a play by Zoe Atkins and then filmed by Warner Brothers let us all know on this board. I searched Wikipedia on Edith Wharton and couldn't figure out exactly which of her works this could be. The screen credit doesn't tell as you see and it certainly isn't The Age Of Innocence or Ethan Frome or any of her more well known works. My gut tells me its quite a bit different from what Wharton originally wrote. By the way the Internet Broadway Database doesn't tell you anything either.It does tell you that The Old Maid ran for 305 performances on Broadway in the 1935 season and starred Judith Anderson and Helen Menken in the roles that Bette Davis and Miriam Hopkins play here. Davis and Hopkins are cousins. Miriam's the bright and pretty one and apparently gets first crack at the men. One she had on a string for a while was George Brent who as the story opens arrives back in Philadelphia expecting to take up where he left off with Hopkins. But Hopkins has decided she wants wealth and security and marries solid Jerome Cowan instead.Davis who's had a thing for Brent volunteers to meet him at the station and break the news. Of course Brent insists on a confrontation just before the wedding, but being the gentleman he always is on the screen, backs off and congratulates the bride. And before he goes off to war Davis gives him a grand send off.But Brent leaves the film early, being killed in the siege at Vicksburg and leaves Davis something to remember him by. Something she can't explain in proper Philadelphia society. Kindly doctor Donald Crisp arranges for a trip out west for her health where she has a baby girl and later comes back and starts an orphan asylum, the idea to build a forest to hide her family tree.The rest of the story is pure soap opera, 19th century style with Hopkins eventually adopting the girl and Davis coming to live with her as 'Aunt Charlotte' to her own daughter played when she grows up by Jane Bryan. There's a lot of tension in the air and the fact that Davis and Hopkins hated each other in real life probably helps the performances. But these two women have put across a lot worse than The Old Maid.What this board could use is someone who knows Edith Wharton and her work and can tell the rest of us what the original story was and how close this was to the story. My gut just tells me that this soap opera was far from what Wharton intended.