Even Joan Crawford Haters Love this Movie. It is said to be one of the Closest Screen Characters to the Real Joan. At least According to Step-Daughter Christina and some other Tell-Alls, like Director Vincent Sherman. Here Monster Joan is Absolutely Unlikeable in a Role that is Manipulative, Domineering, Controlling, and just Completely Selfish. She Haunts the Palace as a Late Arriving "House" Wife Married more to the Domicile than Husband Wendell Corey.There are some Fine Supporting Performances but all Pale in Comparison to this Banshee Crawford, with Her Helmet-Hairdo and Ridiculous Power Clothes, always Lit Like a Ghostly Apparition with Nary a Smile, all Tight Lipped and Flashing Eyes.There are a Few Short Scenes and Lines of Dialog that are a Half-Hearted Try to Lend some Sympathy to this Partner from Hell, but Her Dark Side is so Powerful and All Encompassing that it is Useless and Barely Register after the House of Cards Tumble. Suffice to Say that when No One is Left Except the Inanimate there will be no Pangs and no Tears for Joan Crawford, that is to say, Harriet Craig.

It was exactly a quarter of a century after George Kelly's Craig's Wife opened on Broadway that Joan Crawford followed Rosalind Russell - who had starred in the first film version - into the role of the eponymous Mrs Craig. Crawford, lacking Russell's natural warmth, was perfect casting as the cold, manipulative control freak and could well have phoned it in. As it happened the supporting cast included the likes of Ellen Corby and Lucile Watson but there were albeit superfluous as Crawford could carry this one by sheer willpower and force of personality. Wendell Corey was still getting work wherever mahogany was called for and he did about as well as anyone with the thankless part of Craig, who is there merely as something - as opposed to someONE - for Harriet to fool, foil and manipulate. Inevitably, of course, she gets her comeuppance although she was never a magnificent Amberson so much as an insignificant Craig.

TCM showed this movie immediately after Craig's Wife (this movie is a remake of that one) and I loved comparing the two versions of the same story.The Harriet in Harriet Craig is wonderfully evil and Joan Crawford was perfect in this role. I loved watching her spin her lies and was very curious as to just how her house of cards would fall.I was not disappointed. The scene where Walter confronts Harriet about her lies was brilliantly played by both Crawford and Wendell Corey. Scenes like this are often melodramatic or just not believable. In this movie, however, Crawford and Corey hit it out of the park.With just her eyes, Crawford showed Harriet's inner panic at being found out and her desperation when she realizes that Walter knows the truth.Corey was fantastic at showing the mixed emotions of Walter Craig. He was able to convey anger, disappointment and even love all at the same time. The moment when he found out that Harriet had lied about not being able to have children was just heartbreaking. I felt Walter's pain in that moment.My only quibble with this movie is Joan Crawford's hair. I know they were going for a severe look, but it was truly awful.

Perhaps one of Joan's last great dramas that had the production values, a good script and fabulous costuming; Joan digs her teeth into Harriet making her a very scheming, perhaps mentally disturbed woman. Turning in a great performance as the brittle Martha Stewart of the 1950's, Joan makes Harriet Craig a stand out movie just as she did with Mildred Peirce, showing what she can do with good material. Wendell Corey, at first seemingly miscast, does embody the role of the "Happy go Lucky" nice guy that the part calls for. Not realizing how calculating Harriet can be, she thwarts her cousin's love life, alienates Walter from his friends from his bachelor days, until finally interfering is her husband's business affairs that would take him to Japan, Walter finally see's her for the fist time. As delicate as her china service, Harriet needs everything to be perfect and in her eyes, change is a very bad thing. She cannot be left alone and will not be ignored. She's as antiseptic as her polished kitchen floor, and just as cold one.