The Movie Guide, in giving The Heiress (1949) its highest score, five stars, described the performance of Olivia de Havilland as ‘remarkable.’ Indeed, it was, Miss De Havilland won the Oscar Best Actress award for the role of an unloved rich spinster. It was her second Oscar award, the first for To Each His Own (1946).
Sharing the stellar billing with Miss De Havilland was Montgomery Clift as the fortune hunter and Ralph Richardson as the grieving and stern father who constantly reminds his daughter she didn’t inherit the beauty and charm of her late mother.
The Heiress is based on the novel (by Henry James) and play (by Ruth and Augustus Goetz) Washington Square.
The Movie Guide credited the deft hand of director William Wyler for the triumph of The Heiress. — RKC
(Editor’s Note: This is the fourth of a series on Hollywood romantic films)