BEFORE: I know I said I'd wait until my chain of linked actors runs out in mid-April, but I just couldn't. I had things planned through a film with three major male actors, and I marked that film as sort of a nexus point - my chain could go in three possible directions from there. But which path to take? I decided (for now) to stick with my first plan, because it links an actor from "Avengers: Age of Ultron" right around the time of that film's opening weekend. I just can't ask for a more visible sign from the movie gods than that. So I've now managed to plan through May 10, about a week after the new Avengers film comes out.
Right now, I'm linking to April 1. Originally I had scheduled this film next to "Mildred Pierce", which was part of my Joan Crawford chain last October. But there wasn't room for this one there if
I wanted to finish up the year properly, so I'm slotting it in here, so Alan Hale can carry over from "Destination Tokyo". If you see Alan Hale and think he looks a little familiar, you're probably used to seeing his son, Alan Hale Jr., who played the Skipper on "Gilligan's Island".
THE PLOT: A low-class woman is willing to do whatever it takes to give her daughter a socially promising future. As a result, I don't know whether to regard Stella Dallas as a heroic figure or a tragic one.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Mildred Pierce" (Movie #1,877)
AFTER: I'm having a little trouble with this one tonight, mainly because I'm not so familiar with the cultural mores of 1937 as I could be.
First, we've got Stella's upwardly mobile marriage instincts. By today's standards she might be called a gold-digger, but it's possible in 1937 that this is just the way that things are done. I'm not anti-feminist, not at all - we should have equal pay, equal work, equal everything. And I have a right to be a househusband if I want - I might be terrible at it, but I have my rights. But in 1937 a woman couldn't go out and get a job as an executive, so perhaps the next best thing was to marry an executive. With the way that Barbara plays the character, seemingly with very little emotion, I can't get a read on her - does she love Stephen Dallas, or does she just see him as a means to an end?
Next, we've got Stella as a mother - the day she gets home from the hospital, supposedly those maternal instincts kick in. But Stella immediately accepts an invitation to go out dancing, simply because it took so long to get accepted at that club. The Wikipedia plot description reads, "Even when she is out dancing and partying, she cannot help but think about her child." Umm, if she were really thinking about her child, why isn't she home helping to take care of it? So again, there's evidence that she's a great mother (sewing dresses) but also evidence of the opposite.
Next, there's Stella as a wife - it's a little too easy to say that the relationship suffers because she and her husband are from different classes. He gets the chance to move to New York (from, umm, Boston or something) and she decides to stay put, claiming that she just started to make inroads into high society where she's at. Honey, there isn't any place more high society than New York, so what the heck are you waiting for? This seemed like a flimsy excuse to stay with her recently-acquired new dance partner (later boyfriend?) or else it was an attempt to play the martyr role. No, no, you go on to your fancy New York, I'll be fine right here...
The plotline also states that where Stella is concerned, "nothing is too good for Laurel", her daughter. Well, except for buying clothes off the rack, I guess. Can she really make better dresses by hand than the ones they sell in stores? I assume Stella's getting some money from her husband for Laurel's care, but what exactly is she spending it on? Most likely herself.
So you see, it's not really so cut-and-dry as to whether Stella Dallas is a good mother or not - and you have to admit that any judgment is likely to change if you judge her by today's standards, rather than those of 1937. Divorce is much more common these days, even among couples with kids, while at the time it was considered shameful. But even if divorce was frowned upon, going on a trip with your vulgar boyfriend, basically flaunting your new relationship for a trainload of passengers to see, was probably much worse in that social circle.
Finally, we come to Stella's sacrifice, or is it "sacrifice". She has to determine if Laurel is better off living with her father - certainly he probably represents a more stable relationship environment. But since Stella needs to enact an elaborate deception to bring this about, it's a case where she has to lie to her own daughter, having decided that the ends justify the means. But do they? Is it worth sacrificing a girl's relationship with her mother, just so she can mature in a better environment? I don't think there are any easy answers here. Unless Stella isn't lying after all, and really just doesn't want to raise her own daughter, in which case she's a horrible person.
Also starring Barbara Stanwyck (last seen in "Double Indemnity"), John Boles (last seen in "Frankenstein"), Anne Shirley, Barbara O'Neil (last seen in "Gone With the Wind"), Tim Holt (last seen in "The Magnificent Ambersons"), Nella Walker, Ann Shoemaker, Bruce Satterlee.
RATING: 4 out of 10 party invitations
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