This is probably a stupid question, but why did they use this as the title? As the baby's full name? But Belinda is his mother's first name.
sharehmmmm.....I never thought of that...the baby is named Johnny, and she is named Belinda...their last name is McDonald....
I just watched this, amazingly, for the first time last night...absolutely beautiful film.
No, no..."cruelty." I always think that has a nobler ring to it.
I think because she loved her baby soooooo much, that she wanted the baby's
name to also reflect how connected they were as mother and child.
"OOO...I'M GON' TELL MAMA!"
Belinda was, for lack of a few better words, an adorable lil "honey-bear." I had no idea Jane Wyman was such a cutie back then.
share@twilightfun...she also won the Academy Award for Best Actress for this role. In her acceptance speech, she said something like 'I won this award without speaking...and that's what I'm going to do now'...I wish I knew her exact speech. But that was about it.
shareI must admit, I did not see this movie for decades because I thought it was some western.
Nothing against westerns.
Amazing movie. Deserved all the awards it was up for.
I've always thought the name Johnny Belinda referred to the baby, and that the naming convention was something akin to that in the french film Jean de Florette. When Jean Cadoret moved to another region of France in order to farm the land he had inherited, he was surprised when the locals referred to him as Jean de Florette, because he was the son of Florette. It might be a similar tradition in the area of Nova Scotia where Johnny Belinda is set, possibly due to a french/acadian influence.
It's actually a Gaelic influence. In the Scottish parts of Nova Scotia, people are often referred to by their first name followed by their father's first name - or husband's, in the case of married women. So a man could be officially named John MacDonald, whose father is Alec MacDonald, so John will be called John Alec. If John marries Catherine, she will be called Catherine John, or even Catherine Alec. Usually it's the father's name that's taken, but occasionally it's the mother's - there was a well-known singer in Cape Breton named Tommy Peigi (Peggy) MacDonald, called after his mother. In this instance, it's clear why the child would take his mother's name.
All of this originates in the Gaelic patronymic system - e.g. Iain mac Sheumais is John son of James.