A Movie You Might Have Missed #78 — The Little Foxes

It's been 12 years since I began this series highlighting movies I wished more people knew about. I'm rerunning it from the beginning because I still think these are movies you might have missed.

Bette Davis in The Little Foxes

Regina Hubbard Giddens (Bette Davis) and her scheming brothers plan to get rich from a cotton mill, but first they must tap into the wealth of Regina's sickly husband, Horace (Herbert Marshall). When that plan fails, their schemes devolve into theft and blackmail, driving an irreparable wedge between family members.

Bette Davis killed it in this one. To be fair, so did Herbert Marshall who wowed us by having to do all his acting while in a chair or bed due to his character's bad heart.

This was part of our William Wyler series where we are slowly working our way through his movies. I'd been putting off watching this one because I don't usually like melodramas and I certainly don't like venomous family arguments. However, this one grabbed me and didn't let up to the very end. I was very worried about how sweet Zan (daughter of the family) would turn out. I have to admit that I was also captivated by Davis's costumes and hair. The photo above captures the style of this film which is set in the South in 1900.

Throughout Wyler used all his skill with light and shadow, positions on staircases or balconies and all the other trademark moves. That last shot of Davis looking out the window framed by two bars and withdrawing behind lace curtains should be required on film school tests about effective symbolism.