The Silver Cord

Long before the Freudian craze in the forties thrillers ,"the silver cord" depicted a terrifying mother/children relationship where mom is in love with her boys (and at least in one case vice versa: the boy kisses her on the mouth).

The movie looks like a filmed stage production for we almost never leave the house and there are only five actors (plus a short appearance by the doctor),but it's absorbing from start to finish .Irene Dunne ,as a scientist ,predates woman's lib by thirty years .Frances Dee says the words that are the keys to the movie: " give birth to them ,raise them ,and let them live!" To keep her sons by her side,the mother-in-law you would not imagine even in your worst dreams ,would do anything:she urges her sons to break up ,she even blackmails them with the poor condition of her heart (whereas the physician says she is all right);when her younger son's fiancé tries to commit suicide ,she is not moved that much :Laura Hope Crews ' playing may seem old fashioned by today's standards;but this portrayal of a self-absorbed woman remain convincing and Mrs Phelps is a distant relative of Tennessee Williams' Mrs Venable in "suddenly last Summer"