The first half of Imitation of Life deals with the question from a feminist perspective of what it means to be a woman living in a male-dominated society, while the second half deals with how women of color are affected by racism. Heung notes that it is a story about imitation and pretending to be untrue. Lora Meredith, a white woman, widow, and aspiring actress, always pretends. The motive for this behavior is to avoid the hassle of raising his only daughter, Susie, alone with very little money. Although Lora defies stereotypes by not letting any man control her or interfere with her success, she upholds the proper standards of a good mother.
In turn, Susie’s imitation of life is how she pretends to be a daughter, receiving all the love and affection from someone other than her mother while at the same time desperately showing her love to a man whose love is unrequited. Another heroine, Sarah Jane Johnson, spends her entire life imitating, pretending to be white when she is actually black. Annie Johnson, Sarah Jane’s mother, is a black woman who lives her life with the feeling of always seeing herself through the eyes of others.
Thus, all these female characters are role models in their performances. An exception is only Annie, who, although she lives under the prism of someone else’s opinion, nevertheless accepts the burden of the reality of what it means to be a black woman in a world that does not accept race. However, in the case of Lora, Susie, and Sarah Jane, authenticity is punished in a male-dominated and anti-female world.
It is noteworthy that with her self-deception, Sarah Jane challenges the limitations of her personality and a woman’s role in those times. Refusing to be a real lady or a real black, Sarah Jane plays a series of impersonations throughout the film. On the one hand, she matches the images of a rich musician, which she demonstrates for her white boyfriend. On the other hand, she is a sultry singer for sleazy nightclubbers.
Works Cited
Heung, Marina. “‘What’s the Matter with Sara Jane?’: Daughters and Mothers in Douglas Sirk’s ‘Imitation of Life.’” Cinema Journal, vol. 26, no. 3, 1987, pp. 21–43.