Customer Reviews

Dark Victory: The Life of Bette Davis

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At last a biography that strikes the right balance on the life of Bette Davis. Ed Sikov has written a detailed life of the great actress, covering all the familiar points but without sensationalism and emphasis on irrelevant issues such as that dumb feud with Joan Crawford. (In fact, he deals with this particular issue with superb wit). Everyone knows that Davis was difficult, a control freak with a lightening fuse - she admitted so herself often. She also had a good sense of humour and a work ethic second to none, of course. The book, by intention, keeps the focus on Davis the performer and her extraordinary legacy. This is ultimately what she would have wanted because she knew her private life became a shambles as she broke away from her upbringing as a New England puritan and the marriages piled up.

The author has used Davis's own biographies and personal papers as a reference point and never was her motivation more intelligible. He also seems to have carefully viewed all her films, especially such rare early ones as "Bad Sister", in which she debuted. His analysis of her emerging persona and nervous style is enlightening. Also, there are common themes of Yankee guilt, fear of loneliness and aggressive behaviour fuelled more and more by alcohol. I have never doubted that the bulk of her daughter's book was accurate even if the motivation to write it was mean spirited and commercial. This book adds credibility to "My Mother's Keeper" but certainly not by endorsing it - simply by logic. You might not like Davis much as the author states in the opening chapter, but you may understand her better.

The book is very well written but one of the photos looks suspiciously like Patricia Neal and there are a few holes in the discussion of her performances, most notably, her superb characterisation in "The Catered Affair".

I consider myself to be the world's biggest Bette Davis fan, so I've been eagerly awaiting the publication of this book. It arrived on Thursday and I just finished reading it cover to cover. IMHO, it's the best Davis book yet, and here's why: it's got all the starry stories and bitchy gossip from the golden age of cinema, but it presents them in the context of Bette's movies.

If you love Bette, as I do, because of her work on film, you'll get a much better sense of how her performances came to be -- and also how the moviemaking process affected her life.

It's also something of a reevaluation of her life from different contemporary perspectives, so I now understand better why she's such a gay icon and a feminist role model.

But don't get me wrong. This is not an academic tract. It's been written in an almost chatty fashion that's fun to read but doesn't undermine the serious research that's clearly gone into the book.

In fact, unless you knew Bette personally, I can almost guarantee that you'll learn something about her life and her films. For instance, the stories about what she was like on the set of "The Decorator," her failed sitcom, were new to me.

Yes, there have been plenty of books written about Bette Davis already. But in terms of research, insight and readability, starting now, this is the place to start.

After reading so many biographies on the sensational Bette Davis, I have finally found the one that provides a fascinating balance between her life and her roles. The author succeeds most when he relates the events surrounding each of her movies, without going too much into details of the plot. He balances the narrative with quotes and facts pertinent to the moment that Davis is living at the time. I love the fact that he didnt dwell so much on the Crawford- Davis feud like other authors try to do for the sake of sensationalism. Although he does mention Miriam Hopkins quite frequently. This is great fun and a fantastic way to rediscover Ms. Davis films and it makes you want to go back to your movie library and watch the films again. After reading details surrounding the shooting of films like The Great Lie, All this and Heaven too, The Old Maid, The Little Foxes,Dark Victory, The Letter and even lesser ones in her early career such as Parachute Jumper, I really want to explore them and see things with a different perspective. When an author does that to a reader, I think he succeeds his purpose, which ultimately was to honor the Best Career of the greatest actress of hollywood, without ever falling victim to ridiculous bias neither by defending her nor attacking her. He simply stated his facts and its up to us to decide whether we love her of hate her. I assure you, you wont be indifferent to her.

This biography of Bette Davis is smart, funny, well-researched and beautifully written. But what I like best has to be its emphasis on Davis as an artist. Yes, we all know she was a difficult, driven, often unhappy woman, but she was also a great actress and that's what Ed Sikov writes about. We see her building great role after great role: in OF HUMAN BONDAGE, in JEZEBEL, in ALL ABOUT EVE, even in WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? And she does it inside the studio system. This is not just a terrific biography of an artist, but an excellent history of the movie business.

I loved Davis before, but I love her even more after this book. It makes me want to see the movies I already know and admire as well the couple I missed. I now have a much clearer picture of Davis as a person and also a deeper appreciation of her achievements and how she worked.

This is the only bio I've read on Bette Davis so I can't compare it to any others.

Most of the book is about the 1930's and 1940's when Bette did many pictures under contract to Warner Bros. She was constantly making movies, most of them not particularly memorable. Her personal life is lived in and around her movie making schedule. There's a lot of details about the movies that I will enjoy rereading the next time I see the movie on tv and via a rental. Bette has a lot of affairs during this period of her life, many of which are men who are her directors, costars, etc. It doesn't matter that she is married to various others during this period as well.

Once she leaves Warner Bros., her career life is more varied and spread out as she has more control over it. The author also starts to spend more time on just Bette's personal life as a consequence.

This is a lengthy book that appears to be the result of a lot of research and pulling together a lot of resource material judging from the credits. There were a few times I got a bit impatient and bored but really only a tiny bit. Overall I recommend the book but you have to be interested in the subject.

The Davis that emerges at the end in retrospect is the culmination of all the stories and details the author has presented. I really think the author let others tell Bette's story including Bette herself as he used her own memoir as part of his source material along with many of her print/tv interviews.

I spent most of the time in the back of my mind as I read the book wondering if I could've been a friend of hers as she is really tough on people - at times loyal and at other times rude and angry and very unpredictable.

One of the aspects of the book I really liked was detailing her mannerisms and how she used body language to add nuance and meaning to her acting. Much of this knowledge is tied to specific movies and I am interested to rewatch certain films now because of this.

There's really too much in this book to go into without making this review excessively long. Other reviewers have said a lot already. If you enjoy reading about complex people, want to know more about Bette Davis specifically, want to better appreciate her talent and be able to enjoy her movies based on knowing more of the backstories, this is definitely the book to do it.

I read the Kindle version of the book and need to warn that none of the illustrations are included. The cover page is some generic design so you don't even get the head shot shown on Amazon. There is also a subject index at the back of the book that is inactive - there's no page numbers listed even.

First, I want to say that it to Ms. Davis' credit that after almost 20 years following her death a new biography of Bette Davis is published. Don't expect to see bios of Sandra Bullock or Demi Moore 1 year after their deaths!

I have read many, many bios of Ms. Davis - from the nasty, overly sarcastic and sexist one from Barbara Leaming (how many times can you use 'gimcrack' in a book) to the childish, subjective one by Lawrence Quirk (how did he know the size of the genitals of many of Ms. Davis' partners) to the well balanced and thorough one by James Spada (my personal favorite).

This recent bio is very, very good. Although not always detailed - it provides many insights and understanding into the real personality, private demons and public persona of Ms. Davis that has not been revealed in previous bios. I would highly recommend the purchase of this book.

There are virtually dozens of Bette Davis books that have been released over the years, especially since her death. "Dark Victory" is one of the best. Not only does author Ed Sikov give the reader a nice overview of her life in pictures, but he also goes into great detailed discussion about her personal life. If you have never read a book on Bette Davis before, or simply have just discovered her through her films, this book is a fabulous way to start getting anecodotes and information on one of the screen's greatest actresses. All her films are covered here from "Jezebel", "Dark Victory", "All About Eve", to "Whatever Happened To Baby Jane?". Her marriages and love affairs and her children are discussed in inate detail as well. Mr Sikov writes candidly on the good side of Bette Davis, but he is not shy in writing about her shortcomings. This is an excellent read; I had the book completed in two days. Publisher's Weekly says the book is "perceptive and superbly written". "Dark Victory" also comes with 35 black and white photographs.

"Dark Victory" is a shallow but fun biography of Bette Davis. It covers the entire sweep of her life, focusing especially on her work in films.

sikov's writing style is clear and very focused, which helps because there are many signs that he adores his subject slavishly. and he particularly adores the film 'dark victory' because it's his go-to bette davis and sums up many things regarding her mystique, her stylized and highly effective performances in her best films and her place in the warner brothers pantheon.

but because the heart of the book is this film, it climaxes a bit early. and sikov seems disdainful of davis' later work, not to mention the other films that were released in 1939 and 1940 starring davis.

it does, however regain credibility because he tries to elucidate the pained relationships davis had with immediate family and her oldest daughter, bd hyman. hyman, as everyone knows, wrote a tough-to-take bio of life with her mother called 'my mother's keeper'. i don't remember the book that well. but hyman's self-serving sanctimonious attitude has scored her some well-deserved derision from historians and fans of miss davis.

but the anecdotes that drive davis' life, like the court battle in england, the abusive third husband, her high sex drive and many partners and the wonderful work she did on building characters are very well recounted--just like (pun intended) a boy's favorite fairy story.

Ed Sikov's masterful biography accomplishes something I thought to be nearly impossible; it is a book that is as entertaining as the legend it captures so beautifully. Cinema buffs will love the way he disects and analyzes her movies ( minor complaint, I would have liked to have seen more deconstruction of the performances in Now Voyager ). I've read the odd criticism here and there that he spends too much time on the movies themselves at the cost of details regarding the actress, but that criticism falls flat, in that the subtle point being made is that Miss Davis, to a large extent, WAS the movies she made. It is also to the author's credit that he takes to task previous biographers at certain points, as well as those contemporaries who were unfair in certain criticisms of the actress.

Where Sikov really triumphs is in allowing his marvelous...no FABULOUS! sense of humor to scream through on nearly every page. This is an author I want to have dinner with!

A great read, a thorough biography, and a book that captures the texture of the one and only Miss D.