Jezebel

Bette Davis is an American icon; a goddess of the silver screen. She is a legend in her own right and is the epitome of the brassy, no-nonsense woman who commanded your attention. Men loved her, but they were also intimidated by her. To some, she would have been the ideal choice to play Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind because that persona of hers seemed to line up perfectly with that of the bratty southern belle. David O. Selznick never seriously considered her for that role, though. Instead, she was cast in the role of another southern belle, Julie Marsden, a young, strong-willed, and spoiled girl from New Orleans in the 1850s. She played the scheming southerner well and, even though most felt her turn in the final act unbelievable, she played the contrite and wiser woman well, too. Jezebel is not a great film, but it is a must-see film all the same in no small part because of Miss Davis’ knockout Academy Award-winning performance in it.  

When we are first introduced to Julie, she is engaged to Preston “Pres” Dillard (Henry Fonda), a banker. But Julie, accustomed to having all the attention, doesn’t like it when she cannot pull him away from an important business meeting to accompany her to a dress fitting for the most important social event of the year, the Olympus Ball. The unmarried women are expected to dress all in white for the ball, but to get even for Pres not coming with her to the fitting, she insists on getting a brazen red satin dress instead. 

This backfires when he at first refuses to take her, then changes his mind and then willfully pulls her to the dance floor and makes her dance with him, even as everyone else vacates the floor, staring at her with disdain. Seeing the reaction her dress has gotten, she begs him to take her home, but he refuses and continues to dance. Later that evening, he drops her off at her home and leaves, letting her know that he will not be returning. Like everything else in her life so far, she assumes it will amount to nothing and he will be back to apologize, but deep down she has to know that she has gone too far. 

Pres leaves New Orleans, and Julie sequesters herself inside her home, not leaving except to ride her horse on the grounds. A full year goes by before Pres returns, and when news gets to Julie, she opens the house up again in anticipation of his arrival. But he comes with a surprise: his new wife from up north. Frustrated and disappointed, Julie tries to throw herself at him and, when that doesn’t work, she prods her longtime admirer, skilled duelist Buck Cantrell (George Brent), to quarrel with Pres. This backfires, too, when it leads to a duel between Buck and Pres’ younger brother, Ted. Ted wins the duel, killing Buck, and Julie is once again looked down upon by those around her for what she set in motion. 

Meanwhile, a deadly yellow fever epidemic has laid siege on New Orleans, and the city has been quarantined, with the sick being shipped off to the leper colony on Lazaret Island. As things change for the worse, Pres is struck down by the disease. Julie, now humbled by the consequences of her actions, begs to accompany him on the sick wagon bound for the island, to take care of him and spare his wife what she would find should she herself join him.  

So much of the success of this film falls on the shoulders of Bette Davis. She had won an Academy Award three years earlier for Dangerous, a possible consolation prize after the contentious snub the previous year for Of Human Bondage, where she was a write-in candidate. She spent the next few years demanding a role that would secure her another Oscar. That would come in the form of Jezebel, a film that would play up her strengths as a domineering, yet led by her emotions, figure. She would utilize her highly expressive eyes to good effect, showing us a strong-willed, yet emotionally sensitive woman. We can see this from the moment she comes on-screen, arriving late at a gathering still dressed in her horse-riding gear, refusing to change before greeting the guests. “They’ll get over it,” she thinks, and though she gets plenty of dirty looks for her attire, they do indeed seem to get over it quickly. This attitude won’t serve her for long, though. She makes the same assumption later with her fiancée, Pres, and it backfires.

She seems so confident in her assessment of people that she is willing to go against tradition when it comes to wearing white to the Olympus Ball, even though she prides herself on knowing and understanding Southern tradition. Her attitude about people getting over her improprieties may have worked up to this point, but this one defiant act proves to be far too much, and even she realizes this when she arrives wearing the red gown and sees the reaction she is getting. This is much worse than the quiet disapproval she has experienced in the past, and she almost immediately realizes she has gone too far. You can literally see the panic start to set in on her face as she goes from person to person and experiences their cold disdain. 

Where this film falters is in the final act. Julie’s change of character is abrupt and feels unearned. This isn’t a new assessment, either. Critics at the time called this out, and it was a key reason the reviews were so mixed. That didn’t affect audiences, though, nor did it stop the picture from receiving five Academy Award nominations, winning two. It didn’t get a screenplay nomination, which is fair; this script is fine, but it fails to convincingly give us a character arc for Julie. This is a meaty role—the kind Bette Davis would continue to chase for years to come—but the character and the plot are poorly written. 

On top of that, Pres is an even more poorly written character. His best scene is at the ball, forcing Julie to dance while everyone clears the floor and stares at them. As a love interest, though, he is given nothing to work with. We get that he is handsome and successful, but we get no other reason why she would be in love with him to the point of locking herself away from society for a full year while he is gone. There is some subtext that we can infer, but nothing more. Henry Fonda is better than the material he was given, and he elevates it, but an actor can only do so much with an underwritten character.

For years, I had heard about Jezebel being one of Bette Davis’s best films and had looked forward to finally seeing it. This ended up being a bit of a letdown. There is no great romance, nor is there any great drama. It’s just merely good, and that is a letdown when it comes to the Oscars. Bette won the Oscar, and she is good in this, but she has been equally good in other roles that didn’t get this much attention. I can appreciate this film for what it is, but it just doesn’t quite live up to the hype surrounding it. 

Academy Award Nominations: 

Outstanding Production: Hal B. Wallis and Henry Blanke

Best Actress: Bette Davis (won)

Best Supporting Actress: Fay Bainter (won)

Best Cinematography: Ernest Haller

Best Scoring: Max Steiner

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Release Date: March 26, 1938

Running Time: 103 Minutes

Not Rated

Starring: Bette Davis, Henry Fonda, George Brent, Margaret Lindsay, Donald Crisp, Fay Bainter, Richard Cromwell, Henry O’Neill, Spring Byington, and John Litel

Directed by: William Wyler