HBO was repeating its five part miniseries "Mildred Pierce." I tuned in. The production values were lavish, the period costumes, script, acting, and cinematography were good. Kate Winslet was good in the lead role as expected. Guy Pearce played Monty Beragon. Mare Winnigham had the thankless task of trying to equal Eve Arden as Ida.

A minor disappointment for me was that this adaptation was faithful to the James M. Cain novel. Big mistake. Truth be told, Cain, in my opinion, was a glorified hack. He seemed to constantly rework the sensational 1927 murder of Albert Snyder committed by his adulterous wife, Ruth Snyder, and her paramour, Judd Gray, in many of his books.

Cain was a former newspaperman who managed to sell plenty of hard boiled books with adult themes, including graphic sex, but he failed to turn out a successful screenplay of his own when called to Hollywood. A common complaint of many film viewers is that Hollywood scribes ruined perfectly good books with mediocre screen adaptations. In the case of Cain, however, most of the writers tasked with adapting his novels improved upon his prose.

Raymond Chandler and Billy Wilder combined to adapt "Double Indemnity." Cain was so pleased with the movie that he congratulated Chandler. Supposedly, Chandler was not at all complimentary about Cain's abilities as a novelist. He openly expressed his distaste for Cain's fiction.

SPOILER ALERT:

As a reader, I enjoyed Chandler's books and found that, when he was on his game, Cornell Woolrich was capable of holding my interest and kept me rapidly turning pages. I tried to read some of Cain's fiction and quickly gave up. His writing is often dull and pedestrian. He did not know how to finish books. The actual ending to "Double Indemnity" was somewhat ridiculous: Walter Neff and Phyllis Dietrichson escape justice when Barton Keyes takes pity on Walter and lets him flee. Safely out of the country, the couple decides to jump together from an ocean liner into shark infested waters. In "Slightly Scarlet," a menacing gangster with murder on his mind is eliminated when a woman happens to find an undersea diver's spear gun on the terrace. How it conveniently happened to wind up resting at arm's length on the patio furniture is not explained.

I much preferred the movie climax in the Warner Brothers production of "Mildred Pierce." So did Cain apparently as he sent an autographed copy of his book to Joan Crawford. The HBO version of "Mildred Pierce" follows the original plot of Cain's novel and winds up focusing on Veda's career as a classical singer. She eventually graduates from radio and performs at the Philharmonic. She lies, schemes and cheats at every turn and behaves like a mercenary bitch. Mildred damages her successful restaurant chain by subsidizing her daughter's lifestyle and career while failing to pay her creditors on time. Eventually, her entire business is placed in the hands of a receiver who hires Ida to manage all of the four restaurants.

The conclusion of the HBO miniseries found Mildred finding Monty in flagrante delicto with Veda. After an ugly confrontation scene ends without a shooting, Mommy Dumbest hightails it to Nevada. After obtaining a quick divorce in Reno, Mildred reconciled with her first husband, Bert, and remarried him. Veda breaks her Los Angeles contract and flies to New York to accept a more lucrative singing job in the Big Apple. She announces to her parents that she will reunite with Monty in NYC. Following her departure, her parents opt to get drunk together at one of Mildred's empty restaurants while both agreeing that Veda can go straight to hell.

As much as I enjoyed the miniseries, I found myself missing Ann Blyth and Zachary Scott. Ranald MacDougall's screen adaptation of "Mildred Pierce" greatly improved upon the book and the Michael Curtiz production earned acclaim and recognition as Joan Crawford won the Academy Award for Best Actress. The 1945 movie was 100 proof noir. The stylish 2011 production was a less satisfying light beer,