| Demeter
- Goddess of Motherhood and the Home |
Country (Touchstone)
Jessica Lange embodies the resolute spirit of
American farmers as she fights to keep her land and hold her family together
in this wrenching account of an Iowa farm family faced with ruin. |
|
Eleni (Embassy
Home Entertainment)
The true story of a mother's love and a son's
revenge. Set in 1948 in Greece, this is the true story of an ordinary woman
driven to extraordinary actions out of love for her children, and her son's
revenge against her murderers. |
|
I Remember Mama
(Media Home Entertainment)
A sentimental, nostalgic re-creation of a Norwegian
immigrant family's struggles at the turn of the century. |
|
Mask (MCA)
Cher plays the devoted mother of Rusty, a teenager
whose disfigured face resembles a bizarre mask. Based on a true story. |
|
Places in the Heart
(CBS/Fox)
A nostalgic evocation of life in director Robert
Benton's Texas hometown during the depression. Sally Fields plays the mother
with passion. |
|
The Turning Point
(CBS/Fox)
When her daughter joins the National Ballet,
Deedee (played by Shirley MacLaine), a dance teacher who might have been
a star had she not married, and Emma (played by Ann Bancroft), a renowned
ballerina with an empty personal life, must confront the choices they made
years before. |
|
|
| Hera
- Goddess of Marriage and Society |
Cleopatra
(Twentieth Century-Fox)
Elizabeth Taylor portrays the queen of Egypt,
a woman consumed by her ambition to rule the civilized world. |
|
A Doll's House
(MGM-UA)
Ibsen's examination of middle-class women's
dominance by their husbands. Julie Harris plays Nora, and Christopher Plummer
plays her husband. |
|
Juliet of the Spirits
(Embassy)
Federico Fellini's film about a bored housewife
who starts to have visions when her husband is unfaithful to her.
She discovers for herself a much fuller life. |
|
Macbeth (RCA/Columbia)
Roman Polanski's version of Shakespeare’s nightmare
vision of ambition and violence. If you can find it try the version by
the Mercury Players, it is timeless! |
|
Ordinary People
(Paramount)
Mary Tyler Moore plays an upper-middle-class
wife whose "ordinary" existence is shattered by the death of her oldest
son. |
|
Scenes from a Marriage
(Columbia)
Ingmar Bergman's exploration of a twenty year
marriage, with Liv Ulman & Erland Josephson. |
|
Suddenly Last Summer
(RCA/Columbia)
A poet dominated by his mother is horribly murdered
while on vacation in the Southern Hemisphere. The mother attempts to commit
her niece (Elizabeth Taylor) to a mental institution for revealing the
truth of the incident. |
|
The Taming of the Shrew
(RCA/Columbia)
Shakespeare’s look at male chauvinism and women's
lib in the sixteenth century. A battle of wits between husband and wife,
with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton at their best. |
|
Terms of Endearment
(Paramount)
The story of the relationship of a mother and
daughter over a thirty year period.
With Debra Winger, Shirley MacLaine, and Jack
Nicholson. |
|
Witness for the Prosecution
(CBS/Fox)
Mystery melodrama, with Marlene Dietrich as
the defendant's wife. |
|
|
|
Goddesses
in Dialogue:
The Following films feature two or more of the
Goddesses and their relationships with each other. |
|
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
(MGM/UA)
Hera, Demeter, and Aphrodite lobbying for power
in the family hierarchy. |
|
Gone with the Wind
(MGM/UA)
Athena, Aphrodite, and Dememter themes interweave
in this epic. |
|
Hannah and her Sisters
(Orion)
Dememter, Persephone, & Aphrodite, sisters
in Woody Allen's social comedy. |
|
Juliet of the Spirits
(Embassy)
A shy Hera's odyssey via Persephone to Aphrodite's
world. |
|
Rosemary's Baby
(Paramount)
Innocent Demeter sucked into Persephone's world
as sacrificial victim. |
|
Suddenly Last Summer
(RCA/Columbia)
Hera & Persephone/Aphrodite in a power struggle
over Hera's son's memory and reality. |
|
The Turning Point
(CBS/Fox)
Demeter and Athena in conflict and resolution. |
|
About this information and the Authors:
The material for this article comes from a wonderful
book called, "The Goddess Within" by Jennifer Barker Woolger and Roger
J. Woolger, Fawcett Columbine publishers |
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