27 Thoughts I Had While Watching "Imitation Of Life" For The First Time As An Adult
I remember watching Imitation of Life (1959) as a child, but this was my first time watching as an adult.
Sarah Jane despises her identity because she's a Black girl who can pass as white. She spends the entire movie rejecting her mother's love.
Overall, my perspective on Sarah Jane is what changed the most after rewatching Imitation of Life many decades later. Here are 27 things that I noticed from an adult point of view.
1.Annie wasted no time shooting her shot at employment as she could tell Lora clearly needed the help after losing her child at Coney Island. But it bothered me that Annie was the stereotype of a "mammy" in that time.
In this scene she said, "a maid to live in, someone to take care of your little girl, a strong, healthy, settled down woman who eats like a bird and doesn't care if she gets no time off and will work real cheap."
2.I didn't realize Annie and her daughter were homeless.
I'd hoped for a little more backstory, but the size of it I guess, is that Annie has trouble finding a job in which her child can accompany her. She will do anything to have her child by her side, and her perseverance is admirable.
3.Sarah Jane throwing the Black doll to the ground represents the Brown Vs. Board "Doll Test" conducted in the 1940s.
The children in the study were asked to identify the race of each doll they were presented and choose the one they prefer. This "Doll Test" was conducted to demonstrate the racial perceptions of children, in which most, like Sarah Jane, preferred the white doll. Sarah Jane could see that not all people were treated equally, which is why she did not want the Black doll. She associated it with inferiority. We know this when she says, "why do we always have to live in the back?"
4.Annie basically finessed her way into the job that Lora swore she wasn't offering. She voluntarily did the laundry, cooked, cared for the children, and answered the phone even though she was supposedly only spending one night at their residence.
When Lora got a call about a modeling gig and asked Annie to care for her child in her absence, my first thought was, "ummmm, STRANGER DANGER!" These people don't know each other at all and now one is living with the other and caring for her child while she's working. Now I realize that both mothers were really in a desperate place and needed each other.
5.Lora is completely oblivious to the struggles Annie and Sarah Jane face and when Annie says, "we just come from a place where my color deviled my baby," that's her attempt to illustrate that their worlds are very different. But in reality, Lora will never understand.
6.Putting a can on a fat man's stomach and laughing while it moves up and down? When Annie saw the picture and said, "all I gotta say is lucky I didn't catch Sarah Jane doing a such thing," I noticed Lora's response was waaaaay different.
Here's another attempt to show how differently Sarah Jane and Susie are raised.
7.Lora actually demonstrates entitlement, walking into the agency with a non-existent appointment and a made up connection with a Robert Hayes of Hollywood.
With half entitlement and half acting, she secured an appointment based on a lie and her ability to make Allen Loomis believe her. But his inappropriate behavior during the office visit was also representative of the times saying things like "you have long, silky legs" and "if the dramatists club wants to eat and sleep with you, you'll eat and sleep with them."
8.There was no man that scooped these two up and solved all their problems. These women empowered each other through hard times as they both remained single mothers throughout the film. They leaned on each other, instead of relying on a man, which was against the tradition in that time period.
9.This child would rather die than be Black. She really needed therapy. Sarah Jane is able to see how Black people are treated, and even at a young age, she strongly feels like her life would be better and easier if she was white.
When Annie brought Sarah Jane's rain boots to her school, she was so embarrassed that she ran out in distress claiming that she wanted to die and said, "Why do you have to be my mother, why?"
10.Watching how society treats Black people is why Sarah Jane rejected her true identity and to an extent, her mother could understand saying, "how do you explain to your child she was born to be hurt?" What explanation could trump a child's observation in this era? None, really.
"Sarah Jane has to learn that the Lord must have had his reasons for making some of us white and some of us Black." — Annie
11.Sir, what makes you think you can come in making demands and comment on the validity of someone's dreams when you barely even know them?
Relationships seem to move fast in this movie and I now see that Steve was a bit on the controlling side. Yes, I think he really loved Lora, but he really didn't know her all that well to be telling her what she can and cannot do. He completely overstepped.
12.I thought Lora's response when Sarah Jane asked, "was Jesus white or Black?" was a little problematic.
Lora said, "it doesn't matter, he's the way you imagine." This left the door wide open for Sarah Jane's denial. Dismissing Jesus' color or assigning it to imagination makes it seem like Jesus can be made up, or that he isn't real, which is not the message Annie wanted to send.
13.When Lora said "if he did [stop running around] he'd be sure to find out how sad he really is," she began to realize what was missing in her own life after having success and money. Family. That's what was missing, but she still didn't spend enough time with her daughter after this realization. So it kinda looks like her dream was her top priority... Just saying...
14.Annie was really the only mother Susie had while Lora was out pursuing her dreams. Her explanation of kissing helped her come to the conclusion that she was in love with Steve.
Steve was more or less her stepfather, pursuing her mother, Lora. And Lora was so absent that she didn't even know how inappropriate her affection toward Steve had grown.
15.Deep down, Sarah Jane feels like Black people don't have a chance at a good life. The possibility of a white man wanting to marry her made Sarah Jane feel like she had a chance. She went into the relationship with a lie, knowing Black and white people were not allowed to be married.
"Well, he's white, and if he ever finds out about me, I'll kill myself because I'm white too, and if I have to be colored, then I want to die. I want to have a chance in life. I don't want to have to come through back doors or feel lower than other people or apologize for my mother's color. She can't help her color, but I can and I will."
16.I think Sarah Jane struggling with her identity in the 1940s is one thing, but disrespecting your mother is a whole other thing and after this scene, she deserved a little slap, even at her big age.
She put on a southern accent pretending to be a mammy.
17.Ok, we didn't need the West Side Story-esque music in the background while Sarah Jane's boyfriend is beating her up.
This scene when her boyfriend finds out she's Black and he beats her up is so triggering.
18.Annie was literally fighting for her life at this point and she just shrugs it off as being tired.
She is minimizing her true feelings, trying to remain a strong Black woman because society doesn't let her be anything else.
19.Lora assumed that Annie had no life outside of taking care of them and Annie read her like a book, respectfully. Lora didn't know she knew hundreds of people and then Annie was like, "you never asked." Ooop!
20.Susie was always showing her excitement when the whole family was together. She even stated she was shocked her mom made it to her graduation. It should not have been a surprise once Susie expressed how much her mother's absence affected her.
She was very vocal about that disappointment, so Lora had the chance to make adjustments, but she didn't.
21.Annie knew she was dying. After getting that disturbing letter from Sarah Jane, it wasn't her request that made Annie stop pursuing a relationship with her daughter, it was fatigue.
Before, there was nothing that would stop her, but her sickness was really catching up to her. She even decided to see Sarah Jane one last time but said she would reach her by plane instead of train because she was in a hurry.
22.I wondered if Annie had just told Sarah Jane she was sick, would she have still been so heartless to her mother....
But then again, Sarah Jane wouldn't even let her mother sit down once she was too tired to stand, so I doubt it would've made a difference. She said, "if by accident we should pass on the street, please don't recognize me." Her mother's illness was noticeable at this point, her fatigue and change of behavior, but Sarah Jane was too embarrassed to care.
23.There was a parallel between Susie and Sarah Jane. Sarah never respected her mother and could never fully show or receive love from her. But with Susie, Annie was more of a mother than Lora. She embraced the love she felt from Annie while Sarah Jane rejected it.
Susie feels comfortable around Annie, goes to her for advice and comfort and says, "Annie's always been like a real mother. You never had time for me." You have one mom who overly showers her daughter with love and another mother who is mostly absent. One daughter who wants that attention, and another daughter who dreads it.
24.You know, I always wondered what it would be like growing up rich or the child of some famous celebrity, and this scene is just proof of how difficult of a life that can be.
"You've given me everything, but yourself," Susie said, recalling how she only felt her mother's love through the phone, post cards, and magazine interviews.
25.Annie was on her deathbed apologizing to her daughter when her daughter should have been apologizing to her. "Miss Lora, just tell her... Tell her I know I was selfish, and if I loved her too much, I'm sorry. But I didn't mean to cause her any trouble. She was all I had."
This is heartbreaking and the portrait of a happy Sarah Jane in the background just intensifies the moment.
26.Mahalia Jackson carried the entire funeral scene with her vocals. There was no dialogue needed during this scene, just Mahalia Jackson and her powerful voice!
Seriously, no one else could have delivered that level of pain and remorse, all through song.
27.Sarah Jane really did love her mom, but was filled with so much disgust and anger that she never demonstrated love toward her and never told her how she really felt.
Can't say we didn't see this coming, Sarah Jane crying over her mother's casket when it's too late. I knew she'd never accept her identity, but the remorse after the way she treated her mom finally hit me as an adult when she said, "she'll never know how much I wanted to come home."
What movies have you rewatched as an adult that changed your whole perspective on it?
Let me know in the comments.
