>I am wondering if anybody might have any ideas on recent films depicting
>single mothers -- either as main characters or incidental characters?
>(By recent films, I
>mean post 1960 -- I guess it's not that recent, huh?)
 
        If you could start your project one year before 1960, I would
strongly recommend *Imitation of Life* (1959), Douglas Sirk.  The issue of
single motherhood *is* the film and what makes it such a worthwile text is
that the two single mothers belong to two different races.
        Also, you might want to look at Lucy Fischer's *Cinematernity:
Film, Motherhood, Genre* (1996), an excellent study of this topic.  As well
as E. Ann Kaplan's *Motherhood and Representation: The Mother in Popular
Culture and Melodrama* (1992). Finally, Mary Ann Doane's chapter "Pathos
and the Maternal" in *The Desire to Desire* (1987).
 
        Gloria Monti
 
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