MovieChat Forums > Mother Love (1989) Discussion > Something That Puzzles Me

Something That Puzzles Me

posted 10 years ago by jdcofield
4 replies | jump to latest

Mother Love is great, but something's always puzzled me: Helena calls George pretending to be Ruth Vesey from her own home telephone. Wouldn't that leave some sort of electronic trail through the central phone exchanges? Couldn't the police have checked and seen that those calls came from Helena's number?

Another puzzler: 10 year old Helena poisons Maureen with yew berries stuffed into a tart. Surely there would have been an inquest and an autopsy. Helena and her mother would have had a lot of questions to answer and been under suspicion, especially her mother. It seems hard to believe that neither of them ever faced any consequences, but maybe since it was wartime the police and justice system had too much to deal with.

[–] Helena727 9 years ago

Which is why I respectfully differ and say that Mother Love wasn't great. It was poorly written, with gaping plot holes like those you cited, plus awful dialogue, plus ridiculous plot twists (Kit's tumor, in order to turn him into a captive listening device who will reveal his mother's perfidy) plus plot points you could see coming from a mile off plus a ridiculously stereotypical "American" actress who can't utter one sentence without swearing.

Awful awful awful. A disappointment, and a waste of a good cast + a usually good screenwriter.

"All you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people."

[–] jdcofield 9 years ago

Plot holes and twists like that are typical of Domini Taylor's books, so I guess the writers did the best they could with the material at hand. But I do think Mother Love is a great series with a wonderful cast, despite the difficulties with the plot. Maybe partly it's because I spent a couple of great vacations in London in the 1980s, and Mother Love reminds me of them.

[–] chrisvolt 8 years ago

Would tend to agree. I loved the mini-series, mostly because of the acting and I could overlook much.

I bought the book hoping to enjoy the story in a different way, with maybe some back stories in there, but it was a very, very difficult read. Not very well written. Full marks to the screenwriters for spotting that there was a great story in there trying to get out, because I don't think I would've.

[–] SkiesAreBlue 8 years ago

I enjoyed the series ( bought dvd online - slightly poor quality) and the paperback book which was slightly different. Goes more into the background of the characters. The book says that Domini Taylor is the pseudom of a celebrated author. Do you know who this person might be and what other books has Domini Taylor written? I can't seem to find any.

SkiesAreBlue