BEFORE: This is what I was worried about vis-a-vis October. Because of the set-up for NY Comic Con, plus working there for four days, then the tear-down and recovery, by the time I catch my wits again, October is half gone. Then it's birthday time, Halloween and before you know it, I'm getting ready for Thanksgiving and mailing Christmas cards. Time to buckle down and get these last 24 films watched so I can face the upcoming holidays.
Joan Crawford carries over from "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?".
THE PLOT: After her cheating husband leaves her, Mildred Pierce proves she can become independent and successful, but cannot seem to win the approval of her spoiled daughter.
AFTER: This was another tough one to get a read on - like "Now, Voyager" it's generally about relationships in the 1940's, and that's just not my area of expertise. The battle of the sexes just had different ground rules back then, I don't even know enough about the relationships between my grandparents to have any clue what the word "love" meant to people back in the 40's.
I want to say that Mildred Pierce is an early example of a feminist, but something tells me that's putting too fine of a point on it. She's married at the start of the picture, but gets divorced before long, and then gets married again later in the film, but for entirely different reasons. It almost seems like love and affection aren't ever part of the deal, which indicates that people back then got married out of a sense of obligation, or just to have children - which kind of jibes with what I've heard about the decade, but again, no real frame of reference.
Beyond the relationship angle, I feel like they should show this film in business school. Mildred gets a job as a waitress and then (with the help of her lawyer) turns an abandoned property into a thriving restaurant with NO MONEY DOWN, which is quite a feat. Then this becomes a chain of restaurants, though she later gets squeezed out of her own deal by said lawyer and husband #2. Lots of life lessons here for the wanna-be entrepreneur.
But really, this is about the relationship between Mildred and her daughter, which itself becomes a symbol of class struggle. Wanting the best for her Veda backfires and results in a spoiled child, who wants to associate with the idle rich, but needs to borrow money from waitresses to do so. She loves how much money her mother gives her, but can't stand the fact that it comes from serving "greasy" food. I say, whatever your parents do to keep a roof over your head and food on your table, you better love that thing. My father was a truck driver for 40 years, and he may have come home a little greasy and sweaty, but that was the smell of hard work.
Child-rearing is another topic I'm not qualified to comment on - but obviously there's a school of thought that says you shouldn't reward your kids with everything they want, and you also shouldn't try to buy their love. It's a long time, and a long story told in flashback before we get all the information about what exactly went down at the start of the film.
There's one point in the film where Mildred slaps Veda for being the spoiled brat that she is - and this just brings to mind what everyone later learned about Joan Crawford in the film "Mommie Dearest". That would sort of be an obvious follow-up to tonight's film, but I don't happen to have it on my list. Plus the linking's not there, but I'm going to be pulling a couple of fast ones with the linking in the weeks ahead anyway.
Also starring Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, Eve Arden, Ann Blyth, Bruce Bennett, Butterfly McQueen (last seen in "Gone With the Wind").
RATING: 4 out of 10 singing lessons
One of many great lines from "The West Wing":
ReplyDeleteFirst Lady: "You _bought_ our children's love, with candy."
President: "Well, it was for sale and I wanted it."