SunnyHello Nice effects though.

Borgarkeri A bit overrated, but still an amazing film

SanEat A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

Walter Sloane Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

MaryLois40 I stayed tuned when I saw it was a Steven Hill movie, and that Patty Duke was in it. Of course I'd seen Kim Stanley before and remembered her from television dramas of the 1950s, but LAW AND ORDER has been my go-to show for comfort because of the presence of Steven Hill as the calm, reserved, and wise Adam Schiff over the years. Hill was one of those young firebrand actors from the Actors Studio, along with Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift, with great emotional depth and range, and too little film remains of him except for his creation of the big boss of all those young D.A's.I enjoyed this clunky film--its flashes of brilliant dialogue by Paddy Chayefsky, the simplicity of young Patty Duke's portrayal of lonely childhood, the miraculous transformation of Kim Stanley to Emily Ann Faulkner (a spectacularly bad name choice, I thought), a chattery teenager and needy adult--but even more, I loved Steven Hill's John Tower. John is neglected, as Emmy has been, but has turned inward to the point of suicide. Steven delivers the self-loathing monologues without sentimentality or melodrama, but as the monumental weight that controls his life. He simply tells his story as a neurosis-ridden introvert might. His performance is direct, uncluttered, rather like Adam Schiff's was to be.The movie is worth seeing, for the writing and for all the performances. It does not paint a picture of Marilyn Monroe--later writers and actresses would go much farther in doing that--and, knowing what we now do about Marilyn we'd hardly connect this film to her. But it is an excellent example of the kind of acting that was breaking ground in the 1950s, through the proliferation of live television dramas and the excellent teaching of the craft of acting in New York and around the country. Kim Stanley is a virtuoso, but Steven Hill was too.

DonnaLevin *Marty,* *Network,* and... *The Goddess*? I was looking forward to viewing this film by Paddy Chayevsky, who I admire, and whose script was nominated for an academy award. But it plays like an adaptation of a much richer novel, or perhaps a stage play. On the plus side: Chayevsky assumes that the viewer has a certain level of intelligence, a courtesy not always offered by Hollywood. Characters deliver long, well-written speeches, trusting the viewer both to pay attention and to draw more inferences than than most modern *or* classic films allow. That said, the story feels undeveloped,as if Chayevsky was asking us to his work for him. An important character undergoes a religious conversion without explanation. Marriages end off-scene. The film moves forward choppily, superimposing the year ("1930," "1942") on screen to ground us -- but not very successfully. The camera is on Stanley for almost the entire film and very few performers can sustain our interest for that long -- at least not without a very strong script. To end on another positive note: a studio exec acknowledges that Stanley's character isn't very pretty, but that she has warmth and sensuality with which to engage her audience. The same might be said of Bette Davis or even (gasp) Meryl Streep. I appreciated that bit of honesty.

rube2424 We have come, over the years, to venerate the famous, no matter how good the work they turn out. Paddy Chayevsky wrote some great works, MARTY, of course, for one. THE GODDESS is not one of the them. In order to make a "well made play", Chayevsky leaves out a great deal of much needed character development. Things happen quickly; too quickly in fact, to either have a semblance of truth or make us feel anything for any of the characters. Instead of agonizing over the rise and fall of THE GODDESS, we spend the whole time trying to piece things together to see if the main character IS based on Marilyn Monroe after all. Look...instead of a baseball player, she marries a boxer! "Is that supposed to be Joe Mankiewicz talking about her in that scene? Is that Daryll Zanuck inviting her back to his home? Is the film she's talking about supposed to be GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES? ALL ABOUT EVE? What should be a heart wrenching drama, turns out to be instead, a far from subtle, far too short and badly over written Hollywood guessing game.The wonderful Virgil Thompson did the musical score, but here it is totally out of sync with the rest of the film. His jaunty melodies put us in mind of the WPA films he did with Pare Lorentz instead of the background to a human drama. (To see how good a score can be in illustrating the images on the screen, go to Leonard Bernstein's amazing work for ON THE WATERFRONT.) But the acting IS good. Thank goodness we see what a fine actress Kim Stanley was. Some of her moments, especially the quiet ones, are breathtaking. Sometimes, alas, she is allowed to go over the top. At her best in this film she gives one of the screen's greatest performances; at her worst, and there are moments, she is a caricature of every Tennessee William's female character with a little Eunice from MAMA'S FAMILY thrown in for good measure. Happily, the good moments far out number the bad, and one should see THE GODDESS to see why Stanley is so justly venerated. (Lloyd Bridges and Elizabeth Wilson are also good.) THE GODDESS should have been a masterpiece. Instead what we get is nothing more than a fairly good film. No matter how good its pedigree, THE GODDESS turns out to be no more than a mixed blessing.

bkc1019 As a child growing up in Ellicott City, MD. I was fortunate enough to be in this movie as part of the elementary school class. I remember doing the classroom scene and the school dismissal scene, over and over. But as the years passed, I have searched for a VHS copy of "The Goddess". Now that I have found it, I can obtain it for my children and grandchildren. Lloyd Bridges was one of the great actors of our time, but more importantly, a Hollywood role model as a family man. I guess this was the start of my "showbiz bug". Since that time I have been blessed in the entertainment industry. If you watch the movie "Urban Cowboy" and check out the soundtrack credits at the end, you will see a song called "Hello Texas"(recorded by Jimmy Buffett) which I wrote. Thank you "Goddess" for starting in me at a very young age, the love of the audience and the performance.