Filmography

[the_lady_lily]

Steel Magnolias

When you find yourself staring at the screen thinking 'oh my goodness, they just killed off Julia Roberts', you know you're facing something with a certain pathos value. Particularly when it's just happened as the result of a rejected kidney transplant.

Steel Magnolias is one of those weepy films that supposedly is formative and girl-bond-y for a certain breed of American woman, so I figured that watching it couldn't hurt. Plus it has Dolly Parton's fabulous hair, which I freely admit kept me enthralled - and an armadillo groom's cake, which I felt surprisingly fond of. The film actually manages to be quite quirky and upbeat up until the killing off Julia Roberts part. Normally one wouldn't mind too much, except she's excelled as Shelby, a bratty Southern girl getting married with a quite incredibly insane father and a pair of bratty brothers, and a gently despairing mother, M'lynn. A group of friends she knows through Dolly Parton's hair salon surround and support her, through the wedding, Shelby's choice to have a baby against doctor's recommendations, and handing over one of her own kidneys after the pregnancy is too much for Shelby's body. The kidney is rejected, Shelby goes into a coma and eventually the life support is turned off. M'lynn then gets to have a fabulous collapse scene at the graveside. We end somewhat upbeat at the Easter egg hunt, and the birth of a new baby who will also be called Shelby, and presumably we're in a circle of life thingie.

Oiuser (no idea, played by Shirley MacLaine) and Clairee (Olympia Dukakis) are precious. I am convinced there's lesbian couple subtext there - especially since Clairee's nephew turns out to be gay. It amuses me to see it there, anyway. They've both also got fabulous sniping elderly lady parts; Clairee is sarky high society dame, Oiuser is don't give a damn straight talking scruff-bag eccentricity, and the two complement each other beautifully. I will say that they alone are not enough to redeem the film for me - I enjoyed it in passing, yes, but I have to say that although it was alright, nothing particularly grabbed me apart from these two actresses. And the hair. Big hair. Three stars.

Comments

[ame-chan.livejournal.com]

This is one of my favorite guilty pleasure movies. :-)

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

Although the plot of this story is completely absurd, my understanding is that a goodish bit of it is more or leass literally based on a true set of incidents. I'd have to look it all up again to remember the true parts, although I know the have-a-baby-when-one-should-not was the kernel which inspired the story to be written.

[feanelwa.livejournal.com]

Ouiser is how it's spelt in the script. I had never seen that in the relation between Ouiser and Clairee, but I think this was because an old family friend was playing Ouiser when I was in it. Also, you have not mentioned Annelle at all.

On stage you only get the parts in the hair salon - the funeral is reported by I think somebody who is not M'Lynn, and the story stops in the salon with Annelle heavily pregnant and deciding to call the baby Shelby.

Oh, good times. "Gay men have track lighting".

[the-lady-lily.livejournal.com]

I thought it must be some strange variation of Louisa, but wasn't going to ask. And the scene that made me go 'oh, good grief' was outside the hair salon, and thus quite possibly an extra bit.

I know I have not mentioned Annelle, partially because I don't quite know what to make of her. On the one hand, enough with the cheap Christian bashing already, and why on earth do we never get to see her with a strong personality apart from in the first quarter of the film, and what about this relationship with her boyfriend that develops from going to Shelby's wedding... yes. On the other hand - she is interesting in that first section of the film, she clearly does have a bad-girl element (shown by her wearing contacts and having Dolly Parton hair...), and she does redeem herself at the end by mellowing out the huge over-piety. But I'm very aware that this is the film rather than the play.

"Gay men have track lighting". A universal truth that demands further publicising, I feel.

[feanelwa.livejournal.com]

Goodness, she certainly didn't come over as devoid of personality in the script. We had her in miniskirts and all sorts.

[the-lady-lily.livejournal.com]

Yes, this is how she worked to start with, and then after about half way through she got all washed out, coinciding with her discovery of Christianity, which was very irritating.