Stella's daughter Lollie grated my nerves so badly. She was just such a whiny, spineless goody-goody. The part is written with no depth, substance, nothing. And I was so mad when Stella was being ridiculed by Lollie's preppy idiot friends, and she doesn't even attempt to stand up for her.
What do you guys think?
"Will you stop feeling sorry for yourself?! It's bad for your complexion!"-"Sixteen Candles"
What would you prefer--that Lollie be another Veda Pierce; spoiled, demanding, ungrateful? And she DID stand up for Stella, although not in a way that would bring her down to her friends' level.
Lollie was a loving, devoted daughter who would just as easily sacrifice her own happiness for Stella's sake, just as Stella did for hers.
I would have to agree with NSurone. Lollie, to me, has a lot of deep feeling, loves her mother while being indoctrinated in the "finer things" by her stiff, uptight (excuse me) jerk of a father. It's amazing that she turns out as well as she does with such parental conflict! And I find Anne Shirley a warm, open actress (both here and in "Steamboat Round the Bend") who makes Lollie both pitiable and lovable.
shareI agree. I found Shirley's portrayal of Lollie Dallas to be warm and quite feminine in a way that seems to have vanished from films. Just because a girl is soft, feminine and sensitive does not automatically make her a whiny, weepy brat. It is unfortunate that modern-day mores seem to dictate that film portrayals of girls and women be 'empowering' and politically correct, rather than allowing for a broader view of human character.
shareI'm not saying I want all female characters to be these butch ball-busters, but I would like female characters to have some semblance of a backbone! Some of my favorite characters in literature and film are capable of being intelligent, decisive, assertive, and brave while maintaining a strong degree of femininity and softness. They include Elizabeth from "Pride and Prejudice", Lucy from "The Chronicles of Narnia", and Rebecca from "Ivanhoe".
In the book "The RKO Gals" (1975, ISBN 0-87000-246-5) Anne Shirley herself had this to say about "Stella Dallas":
"Oh, it's hopelessly old-fashioned. It was hopelessly old-fashioned when we did it. No girl in real life, even back then, would have carried on the way I did in that picture. If she'd been unhappy with or embarrassed by her mother, she would have simply gone off to another town and changed her name."
"Will you stop feeling sorry for yourself?! It's bad for your complexion!"-"Sixteen Candles"
I need to get that book.
Mommy to two little monsters
lauraeileen894; That is a good point you brought up on ANNE SHIRLEYs' opinion about her character LOLLIE. Our only thought would be that MS. SHIRLEY was a pretty sophisticated young women when she made STELLA DALLAS having been acting since the age of four (4). She would have had experiences in her life that the sheltered LOLLIE would never had encountered.
shareI agree - Shirley may have thought it old fashioned because she had been in Hollywood a long time before this film was made. Also, she didn't say that Lollie shouldn't have been embarrassed - she said that Lollie would have moved to another town or changed her name. But, Lollie was willing to sacrifice her own wants to spare her mother, whom she loved very much (and whose mother loved her very much).
This is one of my all-time favorite movies. Stella was savvy enough to want money and social position herself - which is why she is interested in her soon-to-be husband in the first place. She is ashamed of her own family and wants to escape to a better life. But, as is still the case today, money does not equal class and bling does not make one genteel. She is smart enough to realize that her daughter has what it takes to fit into the world that she SO wanted for herself but couldn't quite understand or adapt into.
Watch the movie again from the beginning. I thought all of the characters were wonderful and realistic. It would have been unseemly for Lollie to get into a fight with her new acquaintences over her mother's appearance or for her to try to defend the vulgarity. All she could do as a well-mannered person is to do what she DID do and remove herself and her mother from the situation, so as not to cause more pain to anyone. Lollie was MORE genteel than her mother.....AND her new acquaintences. She really was a combination of the best of her mother, father and stepmother.
babybates; The film holds up very well and the evolution of LOLLIEs' character was true as was the inability for STELLA to change or take advantage of the opportunities that DALLAS could offer. Interesting how the STELLAs' family totally disappeared from the film. Have not read the novel so maybe in the interest of compressing the screenplay they were just dropped. Read DODSWORTH and many scenes and background were dropped from it (for the better) to make the screenplay manageable.
Your right about money not being able to provide class or taste. See that on WHAT NOT TO WEAR all the time.
But, Lollie was willing to sacrifice her own wants to spare her mother, whom she loved very much (and whose mother loved her very much).
I'm normally totally sentimental (crying at commercials, etc.), but I felt no sympathy for Stella when I saw this film in a class recently. I saw her as manipulative and scheming.
[SPOILER ALERT]
Even her "sacrifice" at the end of the film I felt was self-serving in that she removed herself from her daughter's life in a cruel way, leaving her daughter to think her mother didn't care about her.
Maybe I was just in a bad mood and need to see it again. (Love Stanwyck, by the way...."The Lady Eve" is my fave.)
I saw Stanwyck's character as caring about her child,thinking she was better off without herself in the picture. I loved all the characters and its a super film in my opinion.
shareIMO, Stella was making a stab at bringing up Lauren to be genteel, as she knew Stephen wanted, but in the end, just couldn't manage it, b/c that's not who Stella was. She could have convinced Laurel to live with her father and stepmother (whom I thought was more than a little smug---but that's just me!) without resorting to making up the story about her own decline and her "love" for that horrid Ed Munn.
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Really? I thought Lollie was really likeable. She's only a sixteen (I think!) year old girl and it was a dificult situation for her. At least she wasn't another Veda Pierce. Now there's a truly despicable daughter! I thought this movie was good about not making any obvious villains-even the new Mrs Dallas was pretty kind when they could have easily written her as a mean snob to inspire more sympathy for Stella.
shareAnne Shirley, formerly Dawn O'Day, turned 18 on the 17th April 1937. She married John Payne in Santa Barbara on the 22nd August 1937. The marriage lasted until January 1942 when Anne walked out of it, taking her daughter Julie, born in July 1940 in The Cedars of Lebanon Hospital, with her. In the 1974 book "The RKO Gals", by J R Parish, Anne says that she married John "...... too young and too soon to escape, only to find herself in a worse bind". Did Anne marry John just to "escape" her own mother, Mimi? Anne also says that she was "forced" to go into the profession and was denied a normal childhood by a too-ambitious mother.
Unrelated to the subject "I couldn't stand Lollie", Mimi was born in England, Great Britain, and Anne's father, Henry Paris, was a clerk in a storagehouse in NY. Also, Anne was born DAWN EVELEEN PARIS.
She did this a number of times during the movie----remember when she kissed her groom? She did this same up-and-down thing. Well, Ann was young when she made the movie; she obviously was trying too hard.
shareShe may have been young but she was practically a veteran actress. I thought she was great.
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