'Stella Dallas'

I think it's amazing that there was someone named "King Vidor." It's almost too hard to believe.

It took Vidor about 10 minutes of his film to completely and utterly disconnect his title character from the audience. At least from me. Maybe it was the character. Maybe it was Barbara Stanwyck. Either way, I set eyes on Stella Dallas and immediately hated her and it only snowballed for the rest of the movie.

I think it takes a pretty special talent in filmmaking to not only complete endear a character to the audience. It may be just as hard to completely alienate a character from the audience.

Dallas isn't a good person. We kept waiting for the other shoe to fall and for her husband to turn out to be a total jackass. But it didn't happen. Dallas inesplicably kept acting like a spoiled brat and the husband remained patient. Still, she kept pushing and he wouldn't push back.

After a while, I started to wonder where this movie was going to go. Eventually, Dallas begins living vicariously through her child to the point of turning her back on their relationship.

I'd almost feel bad for Stella if she wasn't such a giant bitch.