Stella Dallas (1937)

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Movie
Original title Stella Dallas
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1937
length 106 minutes
Rod
Director King Vidor
script Sarah Y. Mason
Victor Heerman
production Samuel Goldwyn
music Alfred Newman
camera Rudolph Maté
cut Sherman Todd
occupation

Stella Dallas is a 1937 American melodrama. It was directed by King Vidor and starring Barbara Stanwyck and Anne Shirley . The film stands in a long tradition of productions about self-sacrificing mothers such as Madame X , The House on 56th Street and The Life of Vergie Winters , which enjoyed great popularity especially in the early sound film era.

action

Ambitious young Stella Martin, who comes from a working class family in Massachusetts, lures highly educated manager Stephen Dallas into marriage. The class differences and Stella's complete lack of social polish doomed the marriage from the start. Shortly after the birth of their daughter Laurel, the couple split up, but remained married. Stephen lets Stella take custody of Laurel. The years go by and Stephen becomes wealthy and he continues to support Stella financially. Despite her own poor upbringing, Stella succeeds in making Laurel a young lady with good manners and manners.

Stephen meets his childhood sweetheart Helen, now widowed, after many years, who lives with her three sons in luxurious circumstances. He introduces Laurel into Helen's family, who are taken with wealth, three boys of the same age and elegant Helen. When Stephen and Helen want to get married, Stella strictly refuses to consent to a divorce. Stella fears that Stephen will take her daughter away from her. Laurel loves her mother and feels responsible for her. Things take a dramatic turn when Stella lovingly organizes a birthday party for Laurel and invites all of Laurel's friends to it. While mother and daughter wait for the guests at the festive table, the refusals gradually come. Alone with her sad daughter, Stella gradually comes to her senses and realizes that only Stephen is able to give Laurel the position in society that she deserves.

First, however, Stella tries to establish her daughter in society through further financial donations from Stephen. In an elite club where she introduced her daughter, however, Stella appears in inappropriate clothing and becomes the mockery of those present. When Stella overhears Laurel crying herself to sleep one night because her friends are openly making fun of her "vulgar" mother, Stella takes refuge in a ruse: She secretly meets Helen Morrison and lets her know about her plan, to withdraw completely from Laurel's life. Mrs. Morrison is deeply impressed by the absolute selflessness and overwhelming willingness to sacrifice Stella and agrees to support the idea. Stella deceives Laurel by pretending to be involved with her drunkard friend, Ed, and eventually drives her daughter to move in with her father. In order to prevent any chance of reconciliation from the start, Stella breaks with her daughter through mock breakouts.

Later, Stella stands outside the window of Stephen's town house and watches Laurel's wedding to Richard Grosvenor, a respectable young man in good company. A policeman wants to drive them away, but Stella asks to be allowed to stand for a moment until the rings are exchanged. Stella walks away with a smile on her face.

background

Stella Dallas , a bestseller from the early 1920s about the infinite depth of the motherly love of Olive Higgins Prouty, was adapted by Samuel Goldwyn in 1925 with Ronald Colman and Belle Bennett . Ten years later, the financial success of the remake of The Path in the Dark , which Goldwyn also first brought to distribution in 1925, convinced the producer to bring Stella Dallas back in front of the cameras. Production was problematic. Ruth Chatterton , initially intended for the role of Stella, refused to play an unsympathetic woman again shortly before after her appearance in Dodsworth . William Wyler , the first choice as a director, also showed no desire to stage the material again, which in his eyes was completely out of date. Meanwhile, the producer tried to win over actresses Laurette Taylor and Betty Compson , but in the end none of the options worked. It was Joel McCrea who brought Goldwyn to Barbara Stanwyck in the role of Stella Dallas. For the character of Lauren, the choice finally fell on Anne Shirley , who had gained fame in 1934 with the film adaptation of the classic children's book Anne of Green Gables , whose career has hardly developed since then. The shooting was tedious. King Vidor claims to have had no access to the material, and the two actresses continually complained about Vidor's apparent disinterest. When the film finally came into the cinemas, everyone involved was surprised by the overwhelmingly positive response from the critics.

In portraying female self-sacrifice, Stella Dallas stands in a tradition of films such as The Life of Vergie Winters , which have been the standard repertoire of every studio since the beginning of the sound film era . These films, so-called. Confession tales to German commitment movies , the suffering of women who had fallen to the wrong man, and all the problems that had opened up after the failed relationship marked. Very often the heroine was forced to do unworthy occupations in order to be able to feed herself and the child. Often she had the choice of becoming a prostitute, like Helen Hayes in The Sin of Madelon Claudet or Marlene Dietrich in Blonde Venus . Or she put her child up for adoption, like Ann Harding in Devotion and Gallant Lady or Kay Francis in The House on 56th Street .

The unbroken popularity of these stories was also demonstrated by the fact that two more films were released almost at the same time as Stella Dallas , in which the heroine does everything to enable her children to have a better life: The second mother with Gladys George and Confession with Kay Francis.

In 1990 another film adaptation of Stella Dallas was made with Bette Midler in the title role and Trini Alvarado as daughter.

Awards

Stella Dallas received category nominations at the 1938 Academy Awards

  • Best Actress - Barbara Stanwyck
  • Best Supporting Actress - Anne Shirley

Reviews

Critics unanimously praised Stanwyck and Shirley's play, but found the plot out of date. King Vidor found recognition for his staging, which would manage to keep events flowing. One reviewer summed up the general consensus and wide popularity when he noted

Nobody went to Stella Dallas daughter's birthday party, but everyone went to see the movie.
Nobody came to Stella Dallas' daughters birthdayparty. Everybody went to see the picture.

From the late 1980s onwards , Stella Dallas was rediscovered in feminist film criticism and became a “figurehead in feminist film theory”. Stella, who was doomed to failure from the start because of her poor origins, is a symbol of the position of women in her “selflessness” towards her daughter. The philosopher Stanley Cavell , on the other hand , saw Stella Dallas more as an "educational film", which is about knowledge and recognition: Stella is not only mother and victim, as her smiling face at the end of the film shows, but strives for "freedom and emancipation" what she consistently pulls off by leaving her daughter behind and ignoring the rules of the upper class.

Web links

swell

  1. ↑ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100691/?ref_=fn_tt_tt_4
  2. ^ Françoise Zimmer: King Vidor's Melodramas. Ed .: Karin Herbst-Meßlinger, Rainer Rother . Bertz & Fischer, Berlin 2020, p. 126.