Dolores Claiborne Question

I just watched it for the first time.

Wasn’t Dolores washing the sheets in Winter once Vera had moved in full time?

Because Vera is a high riding bitch.

Vera moved to the island after her husband had that "unfortunate accident".

Because Vera "kiss my back cheeks" Donovan was a high-riding bitch. She would have passed a brick. And don't even get me started on the China pig!

Our dryer's broken, we're all out of clothespins & could use a hand over here!

Anybody ever notice that, in the book, the gap between the husband’s death and Vera’s death is 25 years but in the movie, it’s only 15. But Vera’s still aged to look 25 years older.

I can't remember, did they ever find the husband or was he just considered "lost"?

They found him.

For people who have read the book (or were paying closer attention to the film) did Vera’s friends on the mainland/children know she killed her husband and cut her off?

She was weighed down by guilt. Not regret, certainly, but guilt.

My stepfather has a cabin in Maine. It's a glorified tent, but its apparently in the perfect location for the 'Total Solar eclipse', and he's invited atleast 20 people to come and join him for the eclipse. I've been calling him Vera, or Lady Donovan since he started inviting people. He voted for Trump, he deserves to be tossed down a mine.

Was that six-pins scene happening in the winter? I don't recall that.

The six pins scene is in summer, Vera's husband is playing golf in the garden.

There's another scene where Dolores is hanging laundry in winter because Vera demands air-dried sheets. I wonder where Dolores hung her knickers?

Yeah, there was a scene, at the end of summer. Dolores is putting drop cloths on the furniture. Vera, after being a high-riding, demanding bitch all summer, asks Dolores to come back next summer. Dolores agrees.

The following summer, Vera has an eclipse party and gives Dolores a little bag with an eclipse viewer. Dolores goes home, gives her husband a full bottle of his favorite whiskey, plus the eclipse viewer.

We all know what happened next.

In the book, they focus on dust bunnies. Can't remember if that was such a thing in the film but I remember in the book that Vera had an obsession with dust bunnies. The woman who played Vera was excellent in that role. I never could get the deal with Dolores' daughter and why she was so bitter and angry toward Dolores.

I wish there were more films made like this.

What a film!

Mildew was grounds for firing!

every time I feel the hot sun on the side of my head, I think of Vera Donovan.

[quote] I never could get the deal with Dolores' daughter and why she was so bitter and angry toward Dolores.

Subconsciously, she blamed Dolores for everything, because if she accepted to herself that it was her father’s fault she had to accept she was being raped. It’s a survival mechanism, but into adulthood, a bandied at most.

And also her father brainwashed her into resenting Dolores as he did in a way to bring them closer. In their early scenes together he almost flirted with her like she was a lover.

Line dried sheets are infinitely better than machine dried.

[quote] Line dried sheets are infinitely better than machine dried

Even in winter! It’s like you can smell the sunshine.

It’s a good film, not a great one. Jennifer Jason Leigh had a hard part to play. David Strathairn is so good in everything. Kathy Bates navigated the stunt (I think it was actually her) of running through the field and leading Strathairn’s character to the well pretty masterfully. I remember seeing that scene in the theater and the audience riveted by that tension, and cheering when she leftover the well.

Strathairn was also great in John Sayles’ Passionfish.

Vera’s “aged makeup” and creepy laugh felt like a Wes Craven character.

^^ “lept over the well”. D’oh.

Kathy was terrific in this

I'd watch this movie over any Oscar-winning snoozefest from the 90s.

Christopher Plummer played the older cop who was out to get Dolores. John C. Reilly played the younger, more sympathetic cop. Both were very good in their roles, esp. Plummer.

Jennifer Jason Leigh, IMO, was the weak link. She played her character like Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club.

The actress (Ellen Muth) who played young Selena (Dolores' daughter) was very good.

Judy Parfitt deserved an Oscar nomination for playing Vera.

I dry my bed linens outside year 'round, even in freezing temperatures.

Jennifer Jason Leigh was brilliant in that film.

Don't you just love the Bossa Nova?

This should have been a "Let's be Dolores Claiborne" thread OP.

Everyone loves DL Icon Vera so much that it’s easy to overlook Kathy Bates’ brilliance.

As someone with zero knowledge of New England speech, it was noticeable especially when John C. Reilly spoke that there was a lot of accent going on in this film. I kind of love that.

I read the book four days ago. Vera wanted the sheets to dry on the clothes line because she believed they would smell better. Dolores was only allowed to use the dryer if it was raining. Vera moved to the island full time after her husband and kids died so this became a year-round activity. It was also implied that Vera had OCD.

R89 I don't think her kids knew that she sabotaged her husband's car. She did feel guilty about taking their father away though and that's why she allowed her teenage son to get a driver's license and bought him a sports car he couldn't handle. She felt responsible for being a bad parent and allowing her kids to die in an idiotic car accident, I don't think she regretted killing her husband.

*r9

Sometimes - it's the only thing a woman has to hold onto R2.

I didn't know Vera had children. Was it mentioned in the movie?

I don't think it was, r37. The whole lying about her children being dead thing wasn't included in the movie. She just had a cheating husband whom she murdered and then never thought about again. I love Kathy Bate's performance but I think the movie cut too many things.

Did Vera allow fabric softener?

It's 4:30, wouldn't you like to watch Cocktail?

🏌🏼

I don’t think Vera mentioned kids in the film and I’d forgotten about them being in the book. I hope Dolores moved into the house once all that murder investigation unpleasantness was over.

Fabric softener is a toxic abomination. When one is a high-riding bitch OCD about the freshness and aroma of line-dried bed linens.

R36 No, and it seemed to be implied that she was childless.

Vera in the novel not only killed her kids in an accident, but also later killed her hunky gardener, with whom she’d been having a years-long affair. He helped her ice her family, but he was still a loose end.

R43 Geez. There’s high-riding bitch and then there’s stone-cold sociopath.

No wonder the film cut that. That's too horrific, even for a film like this.

Wait, R43 are you fking with us? I do NOT remember any of that in the book. Her killing her kids AND her gardener??

To be clear, novel Vera’s kids weren’t innocent little children. They were college-aged shitstains who blew through money and only saw their parents as a checkbook. Baltimore society was better off without them.

The creepy part was that Vera never told Dolores of their deaths. Dolores just assumed the kids stopped visiting decades prior, but they’d still inherit her fortune someday. Vera quietly killed them and didn’t even mourn in her own home.

[quote] They were college-aged shitstains who blew through money and only saw their parents as a checkbook.

Unlike their Serial Mom!

Good thing this was left out of the film.

Wow, I honestly don’t remember one thing R47 is talking about. Guess I should read the book again.

The book sounds intriguing!

I don’t remember the kids and I read the book. Course it was 25 years ago so I’m bound to forget some things.

Maybe we should all do a DL read? I've never actually read it and forgot it wasn't one of his expanded short stories they sometimes adapted.

In the book, the quote is "Six pins, not four!"

At the risk of sounding like I'm queening out (especially here): I hold this movie, and everything in it very close. "Dolores Claiborne" is my favorite Kathy Bates film, and also happens to be her personal favorite role.

They filmed in Nova Scotia from April to late July,1994. All of the darker, colder present-day content was filmed first, and on Kodak film, which produces very cool footage.

The crew then switched to Fuji film (which photographs much warmer), to capture the visually sunny past. This wasn't the first time this had been done, but the attention to detail pleases me greatly, because it really did make all the difference.

The transitions in "Dolores Claiborne" are some of my favorite moments in any movie. They are at once beautifully and cleverly executed. Joe's entrance (a ghost wanders in the front door, bringing the past with him), and the smashing window are excellent. But my favorite is actually a simple one that occurs early, before the opening credits:

Dolores drops Vera's marble rolling pin in the entryway of the Donovan house (breaking off part of the handle), which rolls across the hardwood floor into camera, blacking out the scene.

The camera then immediately reveals to the under/backside of a passing (away from the camera) New York Times truck in the streets of Manhattan, leading to Selena's introduction. It's supported both visually: with the relative weighty mass of the marble pin and the large truck, and by sound: the fantastic grinding of the marble against the wooden floor crescendos as it reaches the camera, culminating in the sounds of NYC traffic. Not groundbreaking, but well-done. I love that sort of thing.

And don't forget the transition after a drunk Selena attempts to leave, but is thwarted when her car is stuck in a ditch. The mist-filled red shot is kind of unexpected, but it's gorgeously striking and is one of the more atmospheric moments in the movie.

"Dolores Claiborne" also features my favorite Danny Elfman score. But I've never found so much as a print interview with him speaking on it. His orchestrator Steve Bartek once commented in an interview that "it was all strings", but it was essentially in passing.

I sometimes fantasize about interviewing Elfman and not even acknowledging the Burton stuff, in the same way no one outside of film score fans ever acknowledges this one. Although, it would be churlish of me, because I love his work on "Batman Returns", and "Beetlejuice".

I collect all kinds of film music, and have the full deluxe version of his "Claiborne" score on my phone. I hear parts of it at least several times a week. I'm currently looking into the possibility of having Elfman sign a copy for me. I'll just be sure not to embarrass myself in the communication, the way I am here.

It isn't a perfect film, but it still inspires me thirty years later. At some point in the next year and a half, I'm going to see the locations in person (I've always had an affection for seaside towns and Nova Scotia anyway), and would love to someday own a few of Dolores Claiborne's costumes and props.

Bonus: actress Ellen Muth, who portrayed Young Selena, shares my birthday.

A tiny, but rare behind-the-scenes morsel at the link, just because.

R53 I love your "queening out". You're among friends here so Queen away. Thanks for the details. I think it's a shame they couldn't finish the post-production a bit quicker to allow for even a limited release in December 1994, it was all but forgotten by the 1995 awards circuit.

Anyone think this might be in part because it had a March 1995 release?

R53 nice post Mountain Mama

[quote] "nice post Mountain Mama"

Thanks, R55. I appreciate that. Thanks for humoring me.

I don’t much like JJL but she’s very good here - though saying she’s like Sheedy in TBC made me laugh.

Someone on Datalounge made me want to re-watch the movie/. Jennifer Jason Leigh is such an unlikeable twat! Otherwise, it's better than I remember.

R58 Leigh, at that time in her acting, overused a mannerism that read like a slow motion nervous breakdown. Her voice would crackle and she’d speak slowly and reach for words. We saw this in Single White Female. It’s hard to play these emotional scenes, but looks harder for Leigh in Delores Claiborne. The poster unthread comparing her to Alley Sheedy was dead on. You can picture someone just off camera whispering “sadder! scared!…that’s right”

^^that’s meant to spell “poster up thread”

cheese and crackas