Mildred Pierce

Mildred Pierce

What is Mildred Pierce about?

Mildred Pierce is a 1945 American film noir movie about a woman, Mildred Pierce, and an exploration of her life after the murder of her second husband, Monte.

The movie starts out with Monte's murder. The police first suspect Wally, Mildred's acquaintance, but then focus on Bert, Mildred's first husband. Mildred tells the police about her past to explain that Bert is not the culprit. Bert was a wealthy man who was business partners with Wally, but Bert and Mildred eventually split because he was having an affair. 

Mildred now raises her daughters, Veda and Kay, by herself. Veda is resentful because their financial position has gotten significantly worse, but Kay is not bothered by it. Wally is also interested in Mildred now that she has split with Bert. Mildred gets a job as a waitress, much to Veda's dismay. She meets Monte, who is a wealthy building owner, and he is willing to sell her a building so she can open her own restaurant. Monte also seduces Mildred, and they enter a relationship. Soon after,  Mildred's daughter Kay tragically dies, and Mildred is distraught. Her business, however, is successful, and she ends up running a restaurant chain.

Veda, still wanting to climb the social ladder, secretly marries Ted Forrester, a wealthy man. Mildred disapproves of this marriage. Veda agrees to end the marriage, but she does so in a scheming way. She lies and says that she's pregnant to get money from the Forresters. When Mildred learns this, she is very angry and rips up the check. Veda then starts performing at Wally's nightclub as a singer and acts in a very sexual way. Mildred is mortified and confronts her, after which Veda coldheartedly tells Mildred she will never be able to give her the life she wants. Mildred decides to marry Monte to attain this high stature and impress her daughter, and Veda comes back to live with them.

Mildred supports Monte and Veda with her restaurants, but her business is not enough to support their overspending and she begins to have financial troubles. She goes to visit Monte to talk to him, and catches Monte and Veda together. Veda tells Mildred that they are in a relationship, and that Monte is going to leave Mildred for her. Mildred runs off, upset, and after she leaves, Monte says that he would never marry Veda. Veda, angry, shoots Monte and kills him. Mildred finds this out and promises to protect her. She tries to frame Wally for the murder, but the cops admit that they already knew that it was Veda. They arrest Veda, and Mildred leaves with Bert, who was waiting for her outside.

Melodramatic Elements

There is much about this film that is melodramatic, and very similar to the Japanese melodramas we have seen. Obviously, social and economic class is one of the central themes of the film, which is a common melodramatic trope. Much of the conflict comes from Veda's constant need to be of a higher economic class, and Mildred's inability to give her that. This storyline is very reminiscent of Stella Dallas and Haha no Kyoku, in which Stella Dallas and Haruko are unable to give Laurel and Keiko the high-class lives they deserve. However, in Stella Dallas and Haha no Kyoku, the daughters are relatively happy with their lives and love their mothers more than they want to be rich and high-class, and the mothers are the ones who eventually decide that they want better lives for their daughters by allowing another woman to raise them. In Mildred Pierce, by comparison, Veda is the one that feels like she deserves a better life, and she resents Mildred, seeing her as an obstacle. While the mother-daughter relationship is tragic but also supportive and loving in the other films, it is toxic and hateful in Mildred Pierce. The women are pitted against each other, even in their own family. In fact, while Stella Dallas' and Haruko's main opponents are the women in their social class outside of their families, Mildred Pierce's main opponent is her own daughter, who she also loves, making for a very complicated and intriguing dynamic.

In many of the other films, particularly Japanese ones, family is strongly emphasized. Often times, conflict arises because the daughters want to marry lower-class men despite the wishes of their families. In this film, however, the mother eventually marries higher-class men because of the wishes of her daughter. Family still has this strong influence, but it is the daughter that holds the power over the mother. We see a sort of shift in power dynamics from the norm, which once again makes for a disturbingly unique turn of events. Family is almost painted in a negative light- Mildred's downfall is because of the love she has for her daughter and her desire to give her a happy light. The final antagonist of the film is the person that Mildred loves most.

Love is also the main theme that most of the melodrama films we have seen have had in common. This movie, however, does not have as strong of an emphasis on romantic love. Mildred marries two different men, but does not seem to particularly love either of them. It is presumed that she loved Bert at some point, but by the beginning of the film, their relationship is already strained, and they split very early on. Bert  emphasizes that this is at least partially because Mildred prefers her daughters to him. She also marries Monte, but she does so to appease her daughter and give her a bountiful life, not because she loves him. Wally is another man who pursues Mildred, but she scorns him, to the point where he seems predatory. In each of these cases, Mildred's love for these men is secondary to her love for her daughters, particularly Veda. The men are not the focus of the film- it is the relationship between the mother and the daughter, and the way it involves the men, that is the focus. These men are almost used as pawns by the two women in their motivations towards each other. Mildred marries Monte to get Veda back, and Veda uses Monte to try and anger her mother. Even Monte's death is a result of Veda's resent towards her own mother, and Mildred's attempted coverup of the murder is also a result of her love for her daughter. These two conflicting emotions are what drive the entire plot of the film, and this circular cat and mouse game of Mildred trying to get approval from her daughter but her daughter moving further and further away.

At its core, the movie is a classic melodrama. Much of the conflict comes from overexaggerated emotions or overreactions. The main driving force of the film is Veda's motivation to be rich, and Mildred's motivation to be loved by her daughter, which is a reaction to Veda's motivation. This is an exaggerated motive, and her hatred for her mother is unreasonable and could definitely be categorized as melodramatic. The climax of the film is when Veda shoots Monte, which is definitely a very extreme exaggeration and comes from an overflowing of emotions that is rather unrealistic. The drama in the film is definitely very forced, and would qualify it as melodramatic. However, as I discussed earlier, what makes this film stand out from other melodramas is the relationship between the mother and daughter, giving that relationship a dynamic that has never really been portrayed in film before.