The Story of Esther Costello (1957) – Joan Crawford

Posted on by womo



Eighteen-year-old Esther has been deaf and blind since the accident which killed her mother. Wealthy Margaret Landi, a native of Esther’s village in Ireland, is talked into helping to educate and possibly heal Esther. Margaret grows to love Esther as a daughter, but finds Esther’s innocence threatened by sleazy promoters and her own sleazy ex-husband.

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37 Replies to “The Story of Esther Costello (1957) – Joan Crawford”

  9. Of course it was necessary to move the plot along, but that means of communication by touching lips and jawbones wouldn’t fly even in sci-fi. A fine old film, otherwise. Crawford considered this her last “really top picture”; after all she got to be rich, glamorous, and beautifully photographed.

  19. Brilliant performances on the part of Joan Crawford and Heather Sears ! It's comforting to know that children and adults who have these impairments can now at least communicate with the outside world through touch….
    A big THANK YOU to all those who dedicate their lives (and those who came before them) to assisting the blind and deaf!

  21. Be he portraying a cad, a rake, an irredeemable monster, it's Rossano Brazzi! And trust him to knock-knock-knock a girl back to her senses! He's delicious!

  23. Got here thanks to an old interview with Joan on British tv where she introduced Heather. Sadly she died age only 58 but what a beautiful girl. She is actually 21 in this film, thanks for uploading

  24. Christina finished high school that year but no one family visited her. Joan was busy with doing a few films and traveling with her husband Al.

  25. Joan wrote Christina about how miserable the weather was and how there were large spiders in her hotel room and that the food was as if it were cooked in castor oil.

  31. I remember watching this movie at the age of ten. I didn't remember the title or the actors, but remembered scenes, my young mind was so touched! I was desperately searching for this movie till now. Great story, excellent acting by Joan Crawford and Heather Sears. My day is made!

  33. Adding to my first comment, the film was also entitled The Golden Virgin which was much more to the point – like the goose that laid the golden egg! Also, Monsarrat intended it as a direct attack on the Helen Keller industry which responded by using its influence to have the film banned. I think that his story was an Orwellian one in the most eloquent sense of the term, and it's a pity it got sanitized by Hollywood – even if a fine job was made of it. Many feminists today would object to having the rape shown as a brutal blessing, in that it jolted the obsessed girl back into the real world, even if the ways of human nature are less laudable than we might think.

  34. It was based on a novel by Nicholas Monsarrat (The Cruel Sea, also made into a movie) to denounce humanitarian con artists who make millions out of gullible donors to worthy causes. The idea of the rape was that it shocked the girl back into normalcy, since her affliction was caused by seeing her mother die in the explosion. The scenes of rallies with robot-like angelical girls holding banners with logos shows the author's political intention – to show that Nazi brainwashing can manifest itself in the most apparently innocent ways. In the novel, from what I have read, the charity fund does everything it can to conceal the girl's cure, so that the money can keep pouring in. The movie falls short of transmitting this highly original concept, but it's still very gripping.

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