MovieChat Forums > Stella Dallas (1937) Discussion > Helen

Helen

posted 13 years ago by bill3-1
3 replies | jump to latest

You got to love Helen. This is the rare movie where the new wife who is a rich, sophisticated, and upper class in every way isn't portrayed as the villain, a snob, a person you're immediately supposed to hate just because she's the new wife and opposite in character to the first wife, the mom, and star of the show (Stella). This is really rare and almost never seen in the movies, and I'm not sure how often it happens in real life either. Helen is a nice, warm, great person, she's super understanding, patient to the end - she wants to marry Stephen but never turns bitter and ugly, she's a mom first and foremost, completely understanding mother/child love and how impossible and wrong it is to take a child, even an almost grown one away from their natural parent that she's lived with her whole life, which makes Helen very smart and warm, she's never manipulative for Stephen's own gain. Helen understands Stella like only a woman/another mom could, and her advice to Laurel is always intuitively on the mark and correct, somehow she knew Stella would never miss her daughter's wedding, and she would be standing outside in the rain watching because that's what she would do if the roles were reversed. As Stella would say "Helen's got stacks of style and class", you gotta love Helen, and Barbara O'Neil played her perfectly, this is Stany's movie all the way, but for me Barbara O'Neil's number two here, what a beautiful, perfect type of woman Helen is, I don't think Stephen Dallas deserves her, but Lollie and even Stella sure do.

This is one of the greatest movies of all time, it has it all, Idk why its not way more famous and talked about, this message board should be rocking, Stanwyck was never better, the whole cast is just about perfect, it's timeless, has a perfect ending, and its heartbreaking and uplifting all at the same time, and don't forget to have 3 Kleenex tissues in hand. Stella Dallas is a 10 star movie and deserves to be in IMDb's Top 250.

[–] beetiesmom 13 years ago

I adore this movie, too, and after reading the original novel, where a lot more is explained about Helen and her sterling qualities (I'm not giving away a crucial point about Helen), I warmed up to Ms. O'Neil's character a lot more, though I just can't get the feeling of a tiny bit of smugness when she tells Stephen "Can't you read between those pitiful lines?" *sigh* (Helen's sigh, not mine). Anyway, this is how I feel about it.....Barbara was amazing as Stella; a really great performance. The "kids" all overacted a bit...."golly gee"!

[–] bill3-1 13 years ago

I just can't get the feeling of a tiny bit of smugness when she tells Stephen "Can't you read between those pitiful lines?

You felt that to be smug? As in snobbery or condescending? I thought that showed Helen to be intelligent, empathetic, and showed real warmth, Stephen wanting to believe the worst in Stella, Helen was pointing out to Stephen pathos and Stella's desperation. Perhaps Helen was a teensy bit condescending to Stephen in this scene but, he deserved it and more for being a cynical misanthrope.

[–] beetiesmom 13 years ago

Maybe it's because I feel that Helen could afford to be a little smug---or maybe it was her posture, I don't know. I was not a fan of Stephen Dallas; he couldn't accept Stella for Stella. He had to keep making it his mission to change her. He was more than a little uptight. Well, if you had someone like Ed Munn hanging around, I guess you'd be uptight, too. During the "turkey scene", I wanted Stell to swing that bird like a baseball bat---and knock Ed's brains out!