I have never seen Mommie Dearest (1981), so I can’t speak to the tie-ins with that film. Wikipedia does assure me that the music video is inspired by both the book and the film. That’s actually kind of interesting. I say that because the song can only be inspired by the book since the album this was on came out two months prior to the release of Mommie Dearest. The music video was released at the same time as the film. That means the song and music video were only inspired by the book. This is according to Billboard magazine, circa September 19th, 1981

Going purely off of the music video, it seems to be doing several things. The first being that Joan Crawford was a force to be reckoned with that should strike fear into people’s hearts if she were to suddenly come back to life. I wouldn’t say that part is explicitly directed at her daughter Christina, but people in general. The second thing would appear to be a commentary on stable studio actors who are all waiting to be stars or struggling to hold on to stardom (Crawford and Davis), and having no problem killing off anyone who got in their way. That part being represented by the Catholic schoolgirls who act like vampires. However, that could also all be part of the way Christina was raised by Joan Crawford. That’s what some sites imply. The music video also seems to be saying that the greatest horror is that she lived so much under the watchful eye of her mother that she became her until we see her broken free to be left silently wiping the makeup off her face by the pool. It could be that the entire video is supposed to be one of Christina Crawford’s nightmares. Of course it’s all speculation based on the music video. I have not seen the movie, nor read the book. I just couldn’t resist spotlighting this during October.

The music video was filmed at Beulyland in Los Angeles that was allegedly the former home of silent film star Mabel Normand, also according to the aforementioned release of Billboard Magazine.

Richard Casey directed it, and appears to have only done a handful of music videos before going on to do other work in film.

George Harrison produced it, but mvdbase assures me this is a different George Harrison than that of The Beatles.

Enjoy!