Butterfield 8

Starring:Elizabeth Taylor, Laurence Harvey, Eddie Fisher, Dina Merrill, Mildred Dunnock, Betty Field, Jeffrey Lynn, Kay Medford, Susan Oliver, George Voskovec, Joe Hamer, Leon B. Stevens, John Armstrong (VIII), Richard X. Slattery, Virginia Downing, Philip Faversham, Eve Arden, Marion Leeds, Helena Stevens, Whitfield Connor
Director: Daniel Mann
Studio: Warner Home Video
Product Type: DVD

Amazon.com essential video

"I was the slut of all time!" declares Elizabeth Taylor in the role for which she won her first Academy Award®. Taylor plays Gloria, a model of loose morals who discovers a last chance at love and redemption when she spends a week with Weston Ligget (Laurence Harvey), a man who married into money and hates himself for it. They fall in love, but before they can find happiness they have to overcome their own worst natures. BUtterfield 8 (named after Gloria's answering service) is a big boozy melodrama, full of gorgeous clothes, catty comments, and emotional showdowns--but along the way it plumbs some genuine sadness. No one can be simultaneously overblown and utterly sincere like Elizabeth Taylor; the movie is mired in the morality of the time, but her performance makes Gloria's mixture of grief and anger seem immediate and genuine. --Bret Fetzer

Customer Reviews:

HOT!! HOT!! HOT!!.......2007-03-08

I saw SOME of this movie as a child and was told to leave the room because it was for "grown ups"..Well I knew I had to have it and
I am glad that I got it..This movie is filled w/allll of the good stuff..
extra martial affairs, alcohol abuse, love, hate, greed and class.

Ms. Taylor is at her best, this movie is fabulous!! I have given it to friends to watch and EVERYONE raves about how they cannot believe this movie was made in 1960...gritty and charming!!

"Liz IS big. It's the picture that got small".......2007-03-07

Elizabeth Taylor was one of the most beautiful women in the world back in 1960 and she's always been a very talented actress. As the promiscuous model that finally fell in love, Taylor was the best thing in the dated, overly melodramatic, often ridiculous movie that was adapted from the John O'Hara's novel (written in 1935). I did not read "Butterfield 8" but I can't believe that the author of "Appointment in Samarra, and "The Lockwood Concern" wrote the stuff the cheap soap-operas are made of. Liz was big and she deserved her first Oscar but there are so many bad things about the movie - uninteresting characters, uninspired acting by the male protagonists, horrible irritating musical score - just a few of them. I read that Taylor hated the move when she was making it and she hates it now - I don't blame her. Taylor - Yes, the movie - no

BOTH Fullscreen and Widescreen!.......2007-02-05

It's a guilty-pleasure movie for sure, but I like those. And i LOVE that we, the consumer, can actually CHOOSE and not have it dictated to us whether we wish to view "Butterfield 8" in 'Widescreen' or 'Standard' (Fullscreen).
Of course, this DVD release was manufactured in 2000, and 7 years later, we are not often given a choice. If 'Gone With The Wind' can (and is) a full-screen presentation, please do NOT insist that, say,'Valley of The Dolls'-- a guilty pleasure if ever one existed--MUST be available ONLY in letterbox since its release last year-- it ruined an otherwise lovely retro 60's style deluxe DVD issue of it. But that's another review...
THANK YOU, WARNER HOME VIDEO for titles such as 'Butterfield 8' that you offer with both Fullscreen and Widescreen versions available.
Oh, and though I am in the minority, for me Ms. Taylor's performance was even better here, more nuanced, in 'Butterfield 8' than in 'Virginia Woolf'- her 2 Oscar performances. "Butterfield" may be glossy and a tad trashy, but her performance elevates it to ACADEMY AWARD gloss 'n trash :)
(Very good supporting performances here also by the catty friend of the mother of Taylor's character 'Gloria', ditto Dina Merrill; with Eddie Fisher just fine as Gloria's ex-stepbrother, or whatever he is. Also in 'Butterfield 8,'-- 8 years prior to portraying Streisand's mother in 'Funny Girl', Kay Medford has some fun with the role of the proprietor of a motel "Gloria" will visit on occassion...Every occasion she can :)

As MGM soap opera, as conventional romantic tragedy, the movie is flavorless, but not impossible, and Liz is all right..........2006-12-23

Liz would seem to have been ideal casting for the role of a defiant call girl, but she didn't like the part: "The role they want me to play is little better than a prostitute," she protested... Most actresses would enjoy the chance to play a B-girl, but Liz never coveted the showy roles, she never played whores or drunks or nuns or aspiring actresses... Her audience wanted to see her in sensational roles, but she preferred being proper...

Rewritten, the edge taken off, John O'Hara's Gloria Wandrous emerges somewhat undefined... The movie is so cautious that it's never clear exactly how the girl makes her living... She models, apparently, but does she get paid for sleeping with men, or does she sleep with men simply because she likes to?

At the height of a family argument, Gloria confesses to her mother that she was the slut of all time, but there is no evidence of this on screen... As in "The Last Time I Saw Paris," Liz--as girl-about-town--is pallid, almost prissy... She doesn't have the freedom to portray amoral characters... She doesn't have the manic self-destructiveness the part requires... The script makes the character another of Taylor's tragic roles: Gloria Wandrous is a woman, mistreated by her man, who dies of unrequited love...

Like the conception of its heroine, the movie is infected with an enervating morality: once a sinner, the message goes, always a sinner... Deep down, this MGM Gloria feels that her indelible history of nights on the town has disqualified her for the likes of a respectable man... Self-convicted as a bad girl, she knows she's doomed... Much more than the novel, the film emphasizes Gloria's lust for respectability... Weston Liggett (Laurence Harvey), the wealthy Yale man, is her one big chance for graduation to the classy life of yachts and weekends in the country... It's as if the character wants to enter the world a younger Taylor so ably embodied in "A Place in the Sun." O'Hara's tough, precise, lovingly detailed novel has been transformed into Metro soap, a lament about a sort of hooker with a persistent desire for suburbia...

But there are moments: the wordless opening scene, Gloria stained and rumpled after a night with Liggett; Gloria trading cracks with her mother's sardonic friend, and with her best friend's girlfriend; Gloria convulsed in tears during an argument with her meek mother (Mildred Dunnock).

Taylor and Laurence Harvey mix like oil and water, but her scenes with Eddie Fisher, who plays her platonic, disapproving buddy are strongly build... Eddie gives her quiet support, the way Montgomery Clift always gave her strength on screen...

Her big scene is her confession to Eddie about how she got started in the life: she was seduced by a house guest when she was thirteen, and she liked it (very wide-eyed, very high-pitched and piercing here), she has always 'liked' it! The confession scene is a Taylor trademark during this period: in "Raintree County," "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," "Suddenly, Last Summer," and here, confessions dramatically lit and photographed are the local points of her performances...

Liz gets the character's self-pity, her sentimentality, her loneliness; she can do the smart answers, the head lifted in defiance... She plays, in short, with an authority that had deepened since "Giant." In "Butterfield 8," she dominates the way a star is supposed to dominate even if, finally, the role lacks definition...

Pure, campy fun.......2006-12-20

'Butterfield 8' is a movie that is good in the same sense that novels like 'Valley of the Dolls' are good: they are pure, campy fun. Dramatic? Yes. A little soap opera-ish? Maybe. Was this film really worthy of an Oscar? That's debatable but I think Elizabeth Taylor did deserve a heads-up for her portay of Gloria. In another actress's hands this movie could have turned into a disaster but Liz somehow manages to pull it off. Chronicling the life of a call-girl was a risky subject for a major motion picture in 1960. One thing's for sure: this movie is not boring. It will have the viewer hooked from the first minute, wanting to know what will happen next. What is most pleasant about the movie is it does not have a happy ending, which would have made a somewhat cheesy film even cheesier. I enjoy watching movies where the characters are flawed and the undertones are dark and sinister. If you're tired of cheerful, happily-ever after movies then you will probably enjoy this.

The Elizabeth Taylor Signature Collection (National Velvet / Father of the Bride / Cat on a Hot Tin Roof / Butterfield 8)

Average customer rating:

A nice fan for Lizzy
Fine collection

The Elizabeth Taylor Signature Collection (National Velvet / Father of the Bride / Cat on a Hot Tin Roof / Butterfield 8)
Starring: Mickey Rooney , Donald Crisp , Elizabeth Taylor , Anne Revere , and Angela Lansbury
Director: Clarence Brown , Vincente Minnelli , and Daniel Mann
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

Classics | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

Signature Collections | Classics | Genres | DVD | Video

Drama | Boxed Sets | Stores | DVD | Video

( E ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video
Similar Items:

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The Judy Garland Signature Collection (A Star is Born / The Wizard of Oz / The Harvey Girls / Love Finds Andy Hardy / In the Good Old Summertime / Ziegfeld Girl / For Me and My Gal)
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ASIN: B0002Y4TNI
Release Date: 2004-10-12

Customer Reviews:

A nice fan for Lizzy.......2007-03-09

Four excellent DVDs are contained in this box, This is Elizabeth Taylor's box, and although our fascination goes more to the boxed set of the Legendary Duo: Taylor/Burton, this nevertheless is a must buy too.

It covers almost thirty years of Liz Taylor's career, starting with "National Velvet" in 1944, followed by "Father of the Bride", the original version of 1950 which actually has Spencer Tracy starring in it, Elizabeth just having a secondary role there, cued by the mythical "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" (1958) and ending with the melodrama "Butterfield 8", the only one in which Liz played opposite her own then husband: Eddie Fisher and co-starring Laurence Harvey in 1960.

The first two come in a full screen presentation (Cinemascope and Panavision widescreen presentations were only introduced in 1953). The other two come in their correct theatrical ratio.

There are no frills here, like specials, interviews or some other fluff, but the movies were decently transferred and the sound, although mono on all four, is fairly crisp and well polished.

Well worth its price if you asked me, and you did not...

Fine collection.......2005-04-21

What a great way to view the first half of her career all in one fell swoop. In National Velvet, of course, she plays young Velvet Brown, the most beautiful little girl ever born, with a love for her horse that knows no bounds. What a shame injury prevented her from playing in International Velvet for Bryan Forbes many years later, though Nanette Newman was very good in the part as well. In FATHER OF THE BRIDE, Taylor is all of a sudden very grown up, and Vincente Minnelli really showcases her youthful beauty and high spirits and passionate nature. The movie is wonderful with details, and although it is really Spencer Tracy's story, both Taylor and her look-alike movie mom, Joan Bennett, have some great scenes and both look ravishing. Yes, Liz was all grown up but the movie doesn't really go to the place of sexuality in the same way that Richard Brooks' CAT ON A HIT TIN ROOF does. Taylor kind of wears that white slip, otherwise it looks like it's falling off of her, and Paul Newman seems suitably aroused, and yet the whole premise of the picture is that for some reason, and what could it be, he's just not up to having sex with her. It's a very funny movie despite its torrid plotline and the sterling performances of all concerned. While Taylor received the Oscar for BUTTERFIELD 8, the final movie of our quartet, she really should have been handed the statuette for her superior work in CAT. As Maggie she created an indelible image that ranks with her finest work (such as PLACE IN THE SUN and WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF).

This DVD set is a good bargain and the films themselves have rarely looked better, though there is some flaking around the edges during early reels of BUTTERFIELD 8.

Average customer rating:

Butterfield 8/Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Starring: Elizabeth Taylor , Laurence Harvey , Eddie Fisher , Dina Merrill , and Mildred Dunnock
Director: Daniel Mann , and Richard Brooks
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

Classics | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

( B ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video
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ASIN: B0007514J4
Release Date: 2005-01-18

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