What's the Matter with Helen? (1971) on Netflix
After their sons are convicted of murder, Helen and Adelle leave Iowa and open a dance academy in Hollywood. Helen fears the elocution teacher Adelle hires, and a phone caller threatens them.
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- Netflix3.0/5
- IMDb6.3/102,497 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes55%
Trailer
Plot summary
In 1930s Iowa, Leonard Hill and Wesley Bruckner are convicted of killing Ellie Banner, and their mothers, Helen Hill and Adelle Bruckner, fight their way through a crowd to their car. Someone in that crowd cuts Helen's hand, then telephones her to say the cut was deliberate and that the two women owe a debt for what their sons did. Helen and Adelle take new names and start a dance academy in Hollywood for young girls. An elocution teacher, Hamilton Starr, offers his services there, and Adelle accepts him despite Helen's fear of the man. Adelle also falls for Lincoln Palmer, the father of one of her pupils, and Helen, jealous of the pair, takes solace in the radio show of the evangelist Sister Alma.
Cast
Show all 14 cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about What's the Matter with Helen? (1971)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
SPOILER
The night before her death scene was filmed, Debbie Reynolds dreamed the prop knife had been swapped for a real one. She checked the next morning, found it had been switched, and argued with a prop master who did not believe her; Reynolds later said whoever changed it was "up for grabs".- Shelley Winters's psychiatrist advised her not to play a woman having a nervous breakdown because she was having one, co-star Debbie Reynolds said. Reynolds said Winters became the character and drove the cast insane.
SPOILER
Film historians called What's the Matter with Helen? the worst-advertised film of its time: the poster and TV commercial showed the murdered Adelle, giving away the ending. Afterwards, studios were more careful to keep end-stills and spoiler material out of horror and suspense advertising.- Shelley Winters suggested her character kiss Debbie Reynolds on the lips to "let the lesbian thing come out for a moment"; Curtis Harrington shot the moment, but it was cut to keep the film from an R-rating.
- Shelley Winters was so difficult on the set of What's the Matter with Helen? that, according to a Los Angeles Times article published during production, the studio threatened to replace her with Geraldine Page.
- Otto Preminger protested to the Motion Picture Association over the film's working title The Best of Friends because he had registered the similar title Such Good Friends. Debbie Reynolds said the title fight cost money.
