"The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio," made me sick to my stomach. Literally. The whole time I was watching it, my stomach churned. I kept watching it because I wanted to see how an alleged comedy would handle its very serious subject matter: alcoholism and domestic abuse.
"Prize Winner" was advertised as a perky, wholesome entertainment. The opening title sequence is cuteness squared. Happy and sunny, late fifties / early sixties fonts, music, dresses, hairstyles, eyeglasses and make-up evoke that era's suburbia with warmth and accuracy. The costumes and set design alone deserve three stars.
The rest of the movie is painful. It depicts a profoundly dysfunctional family. Evelyn Ryan is the mother of ten. A gifted writer, she wins contest prizes in, for those days, huge sums -- sums large enough, in one case, to purchase a modest home.
Kelly Ryan, her husband, is a drunk. Kelly is verbally abusive. He also comes close to being physically abusive. He destroys family belongings. He squanders the family's money so badly that Evelyn must humiliate herself, repeatedly, in front of the milkman. The milkman is evil personified. He's more like Dracula than the deliverer of a wholesome product.
Evelyn, in response to her abusive husband, is a passive aggressive doormat. She never even learns to drive. She hands over complete financial control to Kelly.
The movie wants us to believe that Evelyn is a martyr and a saint and a role model and a gift to humanity and the very best mom her kids ever could have been blessed with. The movie also wants us to believe that Evelyn had to do everything exactly the way she did it. She had to marry a man who was a shiftless drunk; she had to have ten kids by him though she couldn't feed those kids; she had no choice when he became violent.
The Catholic church made Evelyn do it. Male police officers made Evelyn do it. The fifties made Evelyn do it. Evelyn had no free will.
There's a scene where Evelyn is so without funds that she has to feed her children food full of insects. When the children complain, she says, "Those are not insects. Those are spices." The point is not to blame Evelyn Ryan. The point is that the movie lies to the viewer as much as Evelyn lies to her kids when she feeds them insects.
Evelyn married a shiftless drunk, she had ten kids by him, and she handed all power over to him because she wanted to. Evelyn participated in creating a tense home environment every bit as much as her husband. The Catholic church, the police and the 1950s didn't make Evelyn do anything.
A movie that told the truth about a woman who fed her own children bugs would not make that woman out to be a blameless martyr, and her husband out to be a complete monster. A movie that told the truth would explore the psychology of a woman who is attracted to alcoholics, and attracted to the martyr role that the wife of an alcoholic often plays.
This movie didn't do that. Rather, it played with fire -- took up very painful themes -- and tried to convince the audience that these themes were all fun, wholesome, and sweet. Result? In this viewer, a churning stomach.
"Prize Winner" was advertised as a perky, wholesome entertainment. The opening title sequence is cuteness squared. Happy and sunny, late fifties / early sixties fonts, music, dresses, hairstyles, eyeglasses and make-up evoke that era's suburbia with warmth and accuracy. The costumes and set design alone deserve three stars.
The rest of the movie is painful. It depicts a profoundly dysfunctional family. Evelyn Ryan is the mother of ten. A gifted writer, she wins contest prizes in, for those days, huge sums -- sums large enough, in one case, to purchase a modest home.
Kelly Ryan, her husband, is a drunk. Kelly is verbally abusive. He also comes close to being physically abusive. He destroys family belongings. He squanders the family's money so badly that Evelyn must humiliate herself, repeatedly, in front of the milkman. The milkman is evil personified. He's more like Dracula than the deliverer of a wholesome product.
Evelyn, in response to her abusive husband, is a passive aggressive doormat. She never even learns to drive. She hands over complete financial control to Kelly.
The movie wants us to believe that Evelyn is a martyr and a saint and a role model and a gift to humanity and the very best mom her kids ever could have been blessed with. The movie also wants us to believe that Evelyn had to do everything exactly the way she did it. She had to marry a man who was a shiftless drunk; she had to have ten kids by him though she couldn't feed those kids; she had no choice when he became violent.
The Catholic church made Evelyn do it. Male police officers made Evelyn do it. The fifties made Evelyn do it. Evelyn had no free will.
There's a scene where Evelyn is so without funds that she has to feed her children food full of insects. When the children complain, she says, "Those are not insects. Those are spices." The point is not to blame Evelyn Ryan. The point is that the movie lies to the viewer as much as Evelyn lies to her kids when she feeds them insects.
Evelyn married a shiftless drunk, she had ten kids by him, and she handed all power over to him because she wanted to. Evelyn participated in creating a tense home environment every bit as much as her husband. The Catholic church, the police and the 1950s didn't make Evelyn do anything.
A movie that told the truth about a woman who fed her own children bugs would not make that woman out to be a blameless martyr, and her husband out to be a complete monster. A movie that told the truth would explore the psychology of a woman who is attracted to alcoholics, and attracted to the martyr role that the wife of an alcoholic often plays.
This movie didn't do that. Rather, it played with fire -- took up very painful themes -- and tried to convince the audience that these themes were all fun, wholesome, and sweet. Result? In this viewer, a churning stomach.