The Stepford Wives **** (1974, Katharine Ross, Patrick O’Neal, Paula Prentiss, Peter Masterson, Nanette Newman) – Classic Movie Review 1383

Adapted for the screen by expert William Goldman, Ira Levin’s chilling thriller novel emerges smoothed out and tamed down in British director Bryan Forbes’s 1974 film. But it’s still an excellent, richly satisfying movie full of clever ideas and effective performances. Forbes gives it a brilliantly eerie atmosphere and builds in many good, teasing moments, effectively mixing satire with scares.

It makes good use of its star Katharine Ross, who is convincing and authoritative as a new resident of the well-scrubbed town of Stepford, Connecticut, recently arrived from New York, along with her husband Peter Masterson.

There in spick-and-span Stepford, the wives spend all day waxing the floors and discussing recipes, while the men gather mysteriously in an old dark house in a sinister club that is bossed by Patrick O’Neal.

Ross doesn’t take too long to realise that there is something deeply strange about her new neighbours, and soon she is befriended by one of the local housewives, Paula Prentiss.

It was Forbes’s first American film, and there’s naturally a star part for his actress wife Nanette Newman.

It proved a hit and has enjoyed an enduring reputation, so it was followed on TV by Revenge of the Stepford Wives (1980), The Stepford Children (1987) and The Stepford Husbands (1996) and it was remade as a big-screen comedy by Frank Oz in 2004.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1383

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