Added: 1 year ago
From: harriettewinslow
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  • It is nice to see a mother like Bea put her child before romance even though Stephen is her soul mate. If mothers did that more now, more young girls would not fall prey to the dangers of going into hands of the wrong people because they have never known unconditional love from their parents.

  • A lot of Black people want to be White.(sadly) Peola isnt the only one folks. Peola is just more straight forward! lol. What an awful name?....Peola...eww. Also I prefer the 1959 version with the beautiful Lana Turner and Sandra dee..I can't stand the lead actress in this version! yuck.

  • @TVInformative When my mother watched this, she wasn't too fond of the name Peola either. She just thought it sounded funny, haha.

  • That was a wonderful movie! I cried so much! I loved it when it was just Delilah and Bea and the girls in the early days, it was all cosy then just the four of them. The Delilah character was such an endearing person in the film, and whoever she was in real life must have been a lovely person because she was so beautiful looking with shining eyes and a beautiful warm smile.

  • @fluffybunny451 Definately! a beautiful movie with two self sacrificing Mothers! Best version by far! Great acting.

  • 7:07-7:15, she couldn't have thought of this before her mother died...?

  • you don't know what you've got till it's gone.

  • I have seen both verisons and I like them both,there is a message for children and mother and fathers, for the children no matter what you do are where you go a real mother's love never fade and mother will give up everything to make sure that her child has, no child should ever take there mother for granted,because you never no when the good Lord will call them home. Mothers never forsake your children, no matter what. not selfish for your mother is the only best friend you have queen b

  • So the mother loses a chance at true love and happiness because she wants to satisfy her selfish daughter. The message of this film is: White people get rich off Black people's ideas; then the Black woman dies.

  • @grumpyoldassfart actually cancer was known about back then, and named.

  • This is the first time I have ever seen this version. Loved it!

  • ok, now what i want to know is did Peola/Sarah Jane's mother die of cancer?

    i know there was no name for one of those diseases back then.

    I'm assuming cancer because it does wipe you out right?

    btw, i saw both of these movies this morning and both had their good points.

    i want to say the 1934 version is better but then there are things about the other version I liked.

  • The difference between this version and Sirk's remake is (to quote Mark Twain) the difference between lightning and the lightning bug. Sirk's is pure genius, this is uneven. A major problem is a lack of an effective score (compare Skinner's score for Sirk's version). The lack of a romantic life for Peola is another problem since it makes her passing for white an abstraction. Compare Sirk's film noir dance sequence with this mundane cashier sequence. Elmer is one of the oddest characters too!

  • Well, Delilah got her wish. All of her organizations turned out at her funeral. That was a beautiful procession.

  • harriettewinslow? like off of Family Matters?

  • @TXejas19 Yes and you could have even added "Perfect Strangers" for that matter since the character originated off of that show.

  • @harriettewinslow I've never seen it, I'll have to watch it. that's interesting to know though

  • Seeing Delilah laying in the bed dying reminded me of seeing my great-grandmother in her open casket. She passed in May :'(

  • Bea is one hell of a mom! I know that my mom loves me but she would have told me I would get over it and married Stephen. I on the other hand would have done what Bea did :)

  • Jessie is wearing the heck outta that dress!

  • The funeral scene whether it be this version or the superior Douglas Sirk remake of 1959, always chokes me up.

    It's epic melodrama of the most highest order.

  • Thanks so much, harriettewinslow for sharing this.

    I didn't even know that this version existed as I've only seen the second. I found out about this one, yesterday while looking at DVDs in Walmart. I saw a two-movie set for both versions. I was quite surprised to learn of this one. I decided than rather to buy it, I would try finding it on Youtube, first. Thanks to you, I did!

    I prefer the later version, but this one had some good moments.

    Thanks, again!

  • Thanks for posting this great film. I always wondered why Delilah didn't send Peola to Paris or some other place where she could be open about her ethnic background. I know it wouldn't be much of a novel if she did, but that's what I would have done.

  • SPOILER: I can't see why Peola so rejected her mother what with all the fame and celebrity she had. Peola could've simply said "My Mom's Aunt [Jeminah]", and she would have been the most popular girl in school, or anywhere! She wouldn't have to have worried about passing, for she would have been set for life. What a selfish and self-centered girl Peola was!

  • @LandondeeL She wanted to be white. That was all she ever wanted was to be white. Even with all the fame her mother and Mrs. Pullman put together from the pancake business she still would have been seen as low-class because she was still black. Delilah was probably still looked at the same way too.

  • @LandondeeL That isn't true at all. While the movie doesn't spell it out for you, it's clearly understood that life was better as ordinary white person than an outstanding second-class citizen. Peola wasn't selfish, she was trying to live a normal life by any means necessary. I feel for that poor girl, and I cried for both her and Delilah.

  • Correction, they changed the name Peola to Sara Jane in the 50's version, but I would still like to know why the role wasen't played by a black actress.

  • Fredi Washington (a black woman) played Peola in this version and Susan (forgot the last name, a white woman) played Peola in the 50's version. My question is : Why didn't a black actress play her in the 50's remake, does anyone know ? Just curious.

  • The big problem was that there was no concept of "multiraciality" back then. Peola wouldn't have had a conflict if she knew that she could recognize herself as being a black and white woman. That I think is why she struggled...she felt she had to be only one...when that just wasn't the case. And whatever race other people percieved her to be, that is their fault...

  • Thanks for posting this. I usually like the originals much better than the remakes, but in this case the remake was superior. I'd like to find the original Fannie Hurst novel now and see how it differs, as I have already read that in the novel, Peola married a white man and moved to South America. Of course when this movie came out, a movie with an interracial marriage probably would have been banned all over the place.

  • im mad at how this ended. smh

    

  • This movie was made almost 5 decades before I was even born, but you see it and feel those times through these scenes like you were there. The lifelong dream of a servant woman was to have a funeral befitting a queen. She invested her entire life in her afterlife.

  • I always cry at the end of this movie!!!!! Bet Peola felt stupid for not ever appreciating her mother. This version and the newer one are almost like 2 different movies but with the same idea.

  • This final scene in the original and the remake always gets to me.

  • LAME ENDING, it should have ended with peola...

  • I dont understand why ppl dont understand Peola`s perspective. It was just as hard for her. I honestly think Peola was happy her mom died, because she never had to see her again. I`m sure she did feel bad an all but that was just because she knew she wasnt going to see her again, now she cries, and says how sorry she is but its too late

  • @Armaniwazhere COULDNT B MORE WRONG

  • @darkaprilmoon well you`re probably black or whatever or one race and you will never know the struggle of being mix.

  • @Armaniwazhere ..I DO KNOW THE STRUGGLE. mixed ppl dont hide their struggle. half my family is mixed. i understand it completely, i dont have to BE MIXED to know what theyre talkng about.

  • @Armaniwazhere ..I DO KNOW THE STRUGGLE. mixed ppl dont hide their struggle. half my family is mixed. i understand it completely, i dont have to BE MIXED to know what theyre talkng about.

  • @darkaprilmoon You don`t know a damn thing!!! With your bigot ass. Talking about we dont hide our struggle. You think when i`m around a group of black ppl I dont try avoid the questions about race.. HUH? You dont think I feel uncomfortable talking about mulatto`s at predominantly black high school? You fucking Youtube hooker. Do you want me to slay you than revive your life? R U FUCKING KIDDING ME? YOU DIRTY PIECE OF SHIT!!!!

  • @Armaniwazhere--- HA! u made my night with your bullshit. and im mixed myself so dnt try and pull that shit. and when i meant yall dont hide your struggle, i meant when u start talkng with a bff your internal problems about being mixed come out...

    u cant deny that. now about those "funny" little comments regarding who i am..yea u can shove them CUZ OBVIOUSLY U GOT PROBLEMS...and one of them being your education on genetics. i mean, forreal, HOW SELF CONSCIOUS R U???

  • @Armaniwazhere --- do u wish ur black parent was dead? cuz thats what this comment sounds like to me.. JUSS SAYN

  • I watched the remake several months ago and found it be a thought-provoking story, but the original is much more powerful. Also, I think the acting is much better in this version. Thanks so much for the upload.

  • Thanks for the upload.

  • i love this film,it`s make me cry...

  • Thank you, harriette.

    Great acting.

  • @marcxopoco You're welcome. :)

  • @marcxopoco

    This is the better version, hands down.

  • @blacsouljah ,

    I prefer it too. But the later version was good too.

    What a wrenching story.

  • notice the difference in the remake lana turners sucess was based on her skills as an actrress where in the original sucess and fame came from this womans pancake recipe.

  • Thanks for posting...may I also recommend "Stella Dallas" with Barbara Stanwyck.

  • you don't know what you've got till it's gone.

  • They SHOULD HAVE done a one year gap in the 1959 version!!! What had happed after her death!!!

  • @Scoutpower1 There was a 16 year gap after Delilah dies, but it was cut out of the movie because it shows Peola marrying a white man. She does continue to pass. I do believe in the book Peola elopes before Delilah's death.

  • @UsulPrincess

    I didn't know there was a book, will have to check that out. This was my first time watching this version in it's entirety and I liked it. I still love the other one the best though.

  • @UsulPrincess I don't think so. I think in the book she marries a white man and moves out of the country never to see her mother again, even after she dies. The ending was re-written when it came to the film adaption of this movie because of interracial marriages not being allowed at the time. The 1959 version would then follow the ending used in this movie.

  • Why were their names changed the 1959 version?

  • @Scoutpower1 I guess because they wanted to go in a different direction with the story without relying too much on the original film or the book in that matter. The only character who's name remains the same in the 1959 version is the Steve Archer character, even though he's addressed as "Stephen" here.

  • Hate to say it but yes, Peola did kill her mother.

  • @formersk8ter -No the stress of circumstances from the people she worked 4 killed her! Peola is also the product and victim of the racist society, which lead 2 her and her mother's dismay! Put the blame & responsibility where it truely belongs, not on what's easiest! It's easy 2 blame Peola 4 the whole circumstances, yet u must look at the whole picture & not what this mislead'g movie is fasley trying 2 portray!

  • @charlene12341234 The movie wasn't falsely portraying anything. Peola's responded to the stress of the racist society. That response was Peola's decision to shut her mother out and, by doing so, her mother became heartbroken, gravely ill and died. So yes, Peola's actions did kill her mother. Peola herself admitted it.

  • @formersk8ter u r very ignorant N knowing what it is like when society forces u 2 choose against the pressures of being reponsible what they has perpetraded on a person, N the 1rst place! U sound like a white person who doesn't want 2 face the fact of white men neglected their black offsprings, yet wish 2 blame the pressures these chldn must face on the biracial chldn., themselves!

  • @charlene12341234 ... its peopla and society. society for making her feel less for being black, and peopla's fault for not excepting who she was.. a very light-skinned black woman.

  • @darkaprilmoon -it's what a biracial child goes through-more than a "very light skinned black woman" you idiot! Children of very light skinned black parents don't go through this crap,because in reality it is not an issue of one of their parents being "very light" skinned. In reality, children of parents with different races face this very issue-stupid! And this movie tries to hide the fact that it is THE WHITE MAN who denies and neglects his 1/2 black children!

  • @formersk8ter I don't anyone can ever understand what it must have been like to have no identity, do you think black folks in those days would have been anymore accepting? It was never her intent to "kill her mother" she wanted..no NEEDED an identity, and none of the other characters could either understand nor help her.

  • Thanks for posting this!

    Here in Germany we just know the remake from 1959.

    But I like the original movie much more than the movie with Lana Turner.

  • Thanks for this...

    I became more familiar with the remake before finding this original years ago...so i had to step back a bit.

    The remake had large shoes to fill by covering this i realized soon after.

    1934 and 1959 -

    Both gave thought provoking and powerful performances.

    Thanks again...

  • It's just Bea and Peola now...

  • ETA: Peola is not biracial. Fredi Washington had two biologically black parents she's even full black in the movie. She's just playing the stereotypical tragic mulatta role. Notice when she's caught claiming her mother at the casket, she's forced to sit in the colored section of the limousine, while everyone else sits in the comfort cabin.

    In the book, She married a white man, moved to S. America, and never sees Delilah again. The ending is cut off to discourage interracial marriage.

  • Excellent film. Claudette Colbert's performance was great!

    

  • Imitation of Life wasn't just about a mulatto girl, it was also about a young white girl in love with an older man. Its hard to see that at first, Jessie needed a dad, not an old man for a husband---both women sacrificed love of a man for their daughters.---this movie ended better than the one in 1959, when the end was at the mothers funeral

  • @49jubilee I agree. And one daughter who wanted to be just like her mother and the other, who wanted to erase the memory of her mother. This was a story about mothers and daughters and the friendship between two women that crossed all color lines.

  • @AveIvy Of course it isn't just about Peola. Her story is just more insightful to the fact that life was so bad in 1934, light skinned blacks went to great lengths to have a fighting chance at life.

    I love the original SO much better than the remake. All four characters have a convincing Mother/Daughter dynamic. Whereas in the remake they all are trying to "outshine" the original. Claudette Colbert's performance was phenomenal. Giving up your man for your daughter is unheard of nowadays.

  • Imitation of Life wasn't just about a mulatto girl, it was also about a young white girl in love with an older man. Its hard to see that at first, Jessie needed a dad, not an old man for a husband---both women sacrificed love of a man for their daughters.

  • poor delilah.

  • Poor Peola.

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