Beth is a flaming narcissist. As such, she is incapable of loving anyone and needs to put on a front to present as a "normal" person. Maternal narcissism is dangerous for the scapegoat child (Conrad). Buck was the golden child. I'm glad she got "busted" in this film as it typically does not happen in real life with enabling husbands. Fab film.
Straight to the point. Beth's needs were all that mattered and it was difficult for her to factor how other's could possibly be feeling into the equation. All a one way street with her. And yes, it is a gem of a film.
Exorcist: Christ's power compels you. Cast out, unclean spirit.
Destinata:💩
I'm glad she got "busted" in this film as it typically does not happen in real life with enabling husbands.
Beth's type doesn't lose. She's like a killdozer. Unfortunately for many of us, for all the talk of NPD, (etc.), how common it is, and yet how the truth wins out, it doesn't: the word normal defines her far more accurately than many genuinely good people who for various reasons just don't make the cut.
shareNarcissists like Beth lose if her children abandon her, even if she doesn't love them in the traditional sense; there's still a feeling of loss. It often takes a drastic "tough-love" approach to get someone's attention.(the way you do with a child) With some husbands, they are not socially-sophisticated to even feel motivated to make change; they accept things as they are.
shareInteresting take, and you're probably right. Thanks. I was thinking of Beth types specifically, but there are so many other sorts out there.
shareyour welcome. Beth types can be so much alike, yet different. Some mothers can express love, yet be as oblivious and unemphatic to their children and spouse, just like Beth who does not love. Maybe that specific type is called "dense". (Or narcissistic/NPD, without being a "narcissist") Of course, it's only one film about one family from one novel, not meant to be a teaching tool for psych class
share' you're ' welcome
shareYes, and Beth is a made-up character, not a real person. Her role is well written, and as a type she's familiar, yet Ordinary People, being first a novel, then a film, suffers from, well, being about a family that doesn't exist but seems to exist. It's fiction. We can speculate on the inner lives of the family members it's about, but as with all works of fiction, it's good to keep in mind that it's only fiction, good as it is. For all we know Beth is, internally, dull as dishwater, is even more rigid and unimaginative than she comes across on screen and in print.
On the other hand, we can't say or know for sure if this is true: maybe she has a vivid inner life, has, deep down, the soul of an artist even as she has the personality of a housewife. That's the Beth we see. She may, for all we know, live multiple fantasy lives, each a soap opera of a different kind; in one she's the loving, faithful, supportive wife; while in the other she's wild one, has multiple lovers, views the "straight world" with contempt. She could be Sarah Bernhardt one day, Eleanor Roosevelt the next.
The possible "Beths" are endless,--for us. But this isn't the Beth Judith Guest wrote about in Ordinary People. We know only what the author said. My "other Beths abounding" hypothesis was just that, a kind of thought experiment. Only the best writers, the greatest, explore those other "possibilities of self", in one form or another. Judith Guest didn't go there because that's not what she wanted to do when he wrote her book. My guess is that she doesn't (didn't?) possess that level of talent, which is why she wrote the way she did. The title, Ordinary People does kind of say it all.
There may be similar films about narcissistic mothers out there which we haven't heard of, or not as well known, that offer a different slant.
Not so coincidentally, Mary Tyler Moore stars in a TV-film playing a (narcissistic) sociopathic thief who enters her son into a life of crime, with a a solid undercurrent of an overly close disturbing mother-son relationship. (2001's Like Mother Like Son: The Strange Story of Sante and Kenny Kimes)
That's interesting, IY. When looking up Mary Tyler Moore I discovered that she's apparently in dreadful health, suffering from dementia, either literally or virtually blind, and largely housebound. Maybe this is something people who don't like her made up, but it sounds real. She has been in ill heath for much of her adult health.
You can see her decline as far as far back as her TV show,--the one that ran seven seasons--and she looked literally a year older with each passing year. We all age, of course, but with her it was dramatic. When she started the series she was still a babe, at more or less the Elizabeth Montgomery level, but by the time it wrapped she looked haggard and middle aged.
I've read some nasty things about her. There was always, even when she was young and popular, an undercurrent of disbelief about how wholesome she really was; and how nice. There were rumors of alcoholism. I don't know if they were true but she has had by any standards a tough life, especially so, I can imagine, for someone so successful professionally. It's like the god Lord gave her everything, then took it all away.
I feel bad for her, have always sensed that beneath her cool exterior, her nice way of presenting herself to the public, that there was something deeply humiliated in her, that she was ashamed of herself. Something wasn't right with her, and whatever it was, it could not be fixed. That's rough.
I think she's dying right now, and it's to determination and luck that she has lived to the age she has. Diabetes I is rare. However, I thought she looked worn, and older than her 32 yrs when the MTM debuted in 1970 (the sun could have been a factor) It was around season 2 that her make-up and hair changed. Those without diabetes have aged as quickly.
I always sensed this inner-turmoil with her, and she has been surprisingly honest about her insecurity. Because her exceptional talent comes easy for her, she has questioned if it's genuine or not. Her childhood was not economically-deprived, but she had an alcoholic mother and perhaps a cold father. Aside from her health-loss, her sister committed suicide, and she attempted assisted-suicide for her brother.
Sadly, I believe you're right, though given Miss Moore's physical ailments, well, no need to state the obvious. When her show debuted in 1970 I thought she still looked hot. A bit older than on the Van Dyke show, but then she was. It had been four years. Her comeback, as a solo act, and superstar in the making, was a bit of a surprise to me. I always found her a babe, but there were so many on television as good looking as she was and then some, why Mary?
Her personality, voice and poise set her apart. Aside from her expert comic timing she knew not to try to dominate others. On her TV show, I mean. It was the supporting players who shone on The Mary Tyler Moore Show. It's almost like, while it was a sitcom, it played like a variety show, with episodes for Asner, Harper, Leachman, McLeod, Knight and the others who came and went. Nor was she top dog in the newsroom. Interesting concept, and it worked beautifully.
In interviews, Moore always struck me as ruthlessly honest,--about herself--and I don't recall her pointing fingers at others. She spoke well of just about all her co-workers. I remember her praising Ted Knight's serious acting talents to the skies, even as his role on her show was that of a buffoonish character.
The pattern of suicide in her family is awful, and quite frankly it makes her look bad even as it's more likely than not an hereditary predisposition to depression, combined with bad luck. It could be any one of us. That she's rich and famous and has had such tragedy almost makes her look somehow guilty. Her being so open about it has often made her come across as exploiting her misfortunes, which I don't think was the case. It's almost like, as a public figure, she couldn't win.
She made medical history in 1966, at age 30, with her record blood sugar levels and was diagnosed with Type 1.
When she did the "Dick Van Dyke and The Other Woman" special in 1969 she looks younger than she did just a year later when she started playing Mary Richards. But she was still smoking (as everybody did back then) and drinking along with her diabetes. (You could tell she'd had a face lift prior to the final season of the MTM Show).
By most reports, Mary is out of it now, essentially catatonic (and unlikely to see her 80th birthday this Christmas).
But to me, much of Mary's appeal has always been that mostly cheerful demeanor and conflicted, melancholy center. Neither one of them seems untrue or unreal, but exist simultaneously.
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LBJ's mistress on JFK:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcXeutDmuRA
What you said sounds about right, PT, and is beautifully stated. The mixture of wholesomeness and melancholy was uniquely MTM's. There was no one else like her. Even on The Dick Van Dyke Show, when she seemed happiest and looked her best there was that almost impossible to pinpoint way she had about her; by turns circumspect, tentative, a good sport, and yet at the core unknowable, in a way that wasn't off putting or enigmatic, she seemed sufficiently self-aware to understand herself; and because she appeared to know herself so well it was easy to accept those aspects of her persona that were on the surface puzzling. Her lack of empathy, for instance. I never sensed she was cold, just tapped out. She gave her all, but it was all on the surface. There was nothing left in reserve.
shareThe pattern of suicide in her family is awful, and quite frankly it makes her look bad even as it's more likely than not an hereditary predisposition to depression, combined with bad luck. It could be any one of us. That she's rich and famous and has had such tragedy almost makes her look somehow guilty. Her being so open about it has often made her come across as exploiting her misfortunes, which I don't think was the case.
I've seen some of MTM's post-DVD films made just after the show went off the air. She actually appeared in a fair number of features, including an Elvis vehicle, Change Of Habit, and a nice little feelgood comedy What's So Bad About Feeling Good?, and she looked good. I agree that she looked best in black and white, and had she been born ten or twenty years earlier she had the kind of looks I can see doing nicely in classic Hollywood. She photographed beautifully in black and white, which highlighted her features nicely.
One odd thing about MTM and aging, and it's just a matter of timing: from what appears to be the way she was cast her character on DVD was almost certainly older than the one she played on her subsequent series despite her being several years younger. Based on the age of little Richie she ought to have been "pushing thirty" when the Van Dyke show started, well into her thirties by the same it went off the air; while on her later show she really ought to have been in her middle twenties when it began, early to mid-thirties when it ended. As I recall, there was, in the first season or two an age subtext on her show that had her playing a few years younger than she was IRL.
while on her later show she really ought to have been in her middle twenties when it began, early to mid-thirties when it ended.I'm not quite following. Are you saying that Mary Richards aged a lot from 1971 to 1977? I didn't see a significant difference. share
I didn't phrase it properly, I guess: what I meant was that the characters MTM played appeared to be of different ages, thus she was on the young side to be playing a suburban mom, before the age of thirty, while later, when she played a single professional woman,--while her actual age isn't mentioned--she was in real life closer to the age Laura would have been on the earlier show. Whatever.
To my eyes, MTM did seem to age somewhat on her later show, but then it had a longer run, and I believe her health was getting worse.
..thus she was on the young side to be playing a suburban mom, before the age of thirty, while later, when she played a single professional woman,--while her actual age isn't mentioned--she was in real life closer to the age Laura would have been on the earlier show.playing a suburban mom, before the age of thirty, was very typical in 1962, since Moore was 24-25 yrs old when the DVDyke debuted. Mary Richards' age was mentioned; she was playing 30 yrs old. share
much of Mary's appeal has always been that mostly cheerful demeanor and conflicted, melancholy center. Neither one of them seems untrue or unreal, but exist simultaneously.
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That's so sad. I never thought of Mary as being "melancholy" before, but now that you say it, I can't shake the feeling. It makes me think of the closing credits from her show, with the trumpet playing that slightly sad little song. Like you said, "melancholy". Do you recall what it was that first made you realize this about her?
That's so sad. I never thought of Mary as being "melancholy" before, but now that you say it, I can't shake the feeling. It makes me think of the closing credits from her show, with the trumpet playing that slightly sad little song. Like you said, "melancholy". Do you recall what it was that first made you realize this about her?
Yes, Prometheus-64, the 1st season Christmas episode is bittersweet. I get what you mean.
You write very well.
Telegonus, I've never read a more lucid and fair account of Mary Tyler Moore than in your past few posts. Wow.
I adore Mary Richards and feel sorry for Beth Jarret.
Thanks, Hutch. Mary Tyler Moore a deserves a lot of credit, too. She was a straightforward actress, had a kind of not highly demonstrative but open quality to her, unique at the time, and not too common even today. When in character, she didn't hide much.
shareThe possible "Beths" are endless,--for us. But this isn't the Beth Judith Guest wrote about in Ordinary People.
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Which was representative of many other women out there just like Beth. Yes, Beth is a "fictional" character; but her personality traits\disorders aren't. That was the point of Guest's character as she would have wrote it—I haven't read the book for a compare—and Redford's, Sargent's and Moore's screen rendition of her. What was going on with Beth, goes on with many women.
Exorcist: Christ's power compels you. Cast out, unclean spirit.
Destinata:💩
... the stealthy spin she will put on the marriage and divorce to blame Conrad's father will be believed and believed by all.
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Perhaps from her own circles; but at the end of the day, someone like Beth would be her own worst enemy and she would end up dissatisfied with pretty much everything and everyone, and would end up a lonely and bitter woman. Ultimately, they don't get away with it.
Exorcist: Christ's power compels you. Cast out, unclean spirit.
Destinata:💩
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one child - the one and only,
two children - often immense rivalry, a loved one and another one, who seems to be there too, three or more - there is always another brother or sister to team up with and its not all about the affection of the parents.
Beth incpable of loving anyone - I don't think so, not before Buck's death, afterwards she put up a facade out of self-protection