Why so much hype?

Excellent adaptation.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

As you probably know, Bette Davis walked off of "Wicked Stepmother" after just a week of filming, leaving writer/director Larry Cohen scrambling to rewrite his script and get the movie completed. While the end results make sense (sort of), what is really amazing is that Cohen not only managed to sell the completed movie to a major Hollywood studio, he made enough on the sale to make a profit. The movie simply isn't good, which is probably why the Hollywood studio barely released it to theaters. In her footage, Bette Davis not only looks and sounds extremely ill, she doesn't seem to give a darn about this project. The other actors come across somewhat better, but even they aren't able to generate laughs at any point in the movie. The screenplay they are stuck with simply isn't funny at all. The heavily rewritted screenplay also (perhaps inevitably) feels like Cohen is making things up as he goes along. It also doesn't help that the special effects are mostly pretty cheesy, even for an 1980s film. In short, the movie is a low point for Davis, Cohen, studio Metro Goldwyn Mayer, and everybody else involved with it.

WICKED STEPMOTHER is the kind of movie that happens to an actor who cannot understand that his or her time has passed, and that encroaching illness and the approximation of death should be an indicative that maybe it would be best to relax and enjoy the accolades, retrospectives, and lifetime achievement awards.Bette Davis was coming off the mild success of THE WHALES OF AUGUST when she decided to do this movie about a witch who moves into a family's home and causes havoc there. Severely ill, barely able to remember her lines, and frail as a leaf about to fall from its branch in the middle of fall, she was forced to step out of filming only a week after production on the movie began.Surprisingly enough, she claimed problems with the script among other things, making it clear that old age and illness had not mellowed her character one bit. What she seemed unable to understand that this sort of demands which she had been known for back in her prime was supremely out of style by now, and for an actress of her stature to assume she could throw her ego around just because, was pushing it a little.Hence, her scenes remain in this movie and should have probably been either deleted and replaced with another actress. I can only assume that the director did not have the money to replace Davis, and decided to keep her character and have Barbara Carrera step in, adding a ludicrous set-up that would explain Davis' absence from the movie. As it is, WICKED STEPMOTHER remains as Bette Davis' last film, one that can be bypassed as an gargantuan error on her behalf.

Wow was this BAD!!! Bette Davis (in her last film role sad to say) is a witch who marries Lionel Stander (wisely walking through his role) and invades his house which he shares with his adult children (Colleen Camp and David Rasche). Things "comically" spin out of control. Then Davis disappears (she wisely left after a week of shooting) and is replaced by sexy Barbara Carrera. With Davis gone this officially became unwatchable--I turned it off after an hour.Before this "Burnt Offerings" was Davis' worst film--this is 100 times worse! I admit she does have a fun opening line--"Call me mom!" but she looks terrible. Her speech is slurred because of one of the strokes she had and wears a terrible red wig. Davis was obviously very ill when she did this. Still, despite it all, she manages to make the most of her small screen time. All the dialogue is terrible with tons of unfunny comedy but Davis bravely makes the worst lines sound quite funny. And there is a somewhat funny visual joke revealing Camp's former mother was Joan Crawford! It's a shock seeing Davis looking this terrible and--basically--the film is just dreadful. MGM released THIS? Also when Carrara takes over it actually gets worse. She is very beautiful--but no actress.I only saw this because it was Davis' last film. I wish I hadn't. A total bomb. AVOID at all costs!!

Inane, ridiculous, boring, stupid, hilariously bad. This movie is all these things and more. "Leonard: Part 6" was Oscar-worthy compared to this. I feel fairly confident that I could have come up with a better movie by having no script at all and just telling the actors to improvise their lines. At least Bette Davis had the sense to realize how beneath her this movie was. The thing is, this movie is beneath the acting skills of most of the people in it. Including the cat.