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Bette Davis lived long enough to hear the Kim Carnes song, ‘Bette Davis Eyes’. The lyrics to that song were not very interesting. But the fact of the song was the proof of an acknowledgement that in the twentieth century we lived through an age of immense romantic personalities larger than life, yet models for it, too – for good or ill. Like twin moons, promising a struggle and an embrace, the Davis eyes would survive her – and us. Kim Carnes has hardly had a consistent career, but that one song – sluggish yet surging, druggy and dreamy – became an instant classic. It’s like the sigh of the islanders when they behold their Kong. And I suspect it made the real eyes smile, whatever else was on their mind.
