Five Dead Movie Mothers

[mothwing]

If I was a heroine in a story in whatever medium I'd never, ever want to have children. That seems to be the safest way to either be disposed unceremoniously before the story even starts, or to die for my offspring, while, or shortly after my offspring are born. While having a daughter has mothers dying in childbirth to make way for the evil stepmother (especially in fairy tales), having sons seems to doom mothers to tear-jerky demises saving said sons from their future nemises.

These are the five dead movie mothers that drove home this point to me most in chronological order.

1. Bambi's Mother (Mother)

Cause of death: bullet.

Reason: tries to divert some hunter's attention from her son.
Role: I don't think she's more than an end-of-innocence boost for the story, really.


2. Littlefoot's Mother ("Mother")

Cause of death: dino bites. 

Reason: saves her son from his nemesis-to-be.
Role: again, she seems to be little more than a reason to kick off the plot, and an extremely tear-jerky red-shirt to show how very very dangerous Sharptooth is.


3. Quasimodo's mother (nameless)

Cause of death: brained on the stairs of Notre Dame.

Reason: wants to save her son, instead gets wrongly accused of her son's nemesis-to-be and killed by him, though by accident.
Role: underlines how very heartless Frollo is and to show that our hero's mother, whom he never met, didn't abandon him but really cared for him. Another pointless tear-jerk moment.


4. Harry's mother (Lily Potter, née Evans)

Cause of death: killing curse.

Reason: dying instead of her son, who is about to be killed by his nemsis.
Role:  supplier of backstory, subplot and hero's special superpowers. And secondary villains' love interest, much like: 


5. Leia and Luke's mother (Padmé Amidala)

Cause of death: a... broken heart? Having been chocked by her recently converted husband? I never figured that out, and I'm not sure I want to.

Reason: underlines how truly evil her husband is?
Role: dead love interest, mostly - and she's still better of than Shmi, who, in terms of plot, seems to be Reason for Revenge as well as tear-jerker.

Who is your favourite dead movie mother?

Comments

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I don't have a particular favorite. I know exactly what you're talking about and it always bothered me how women were often defined by their absence (usually due to death) on television and in movies for a long time. Obviously not always, but I noticed a lot of widowers before I turned 10. And of course, the number of women killed on screen to motivate their husbands and fathers. Right now I can only name Death Wish and the Courtship of Eddie's Father right offhand, but there were many more.

I was actually okay with Lily Potter's death because James Potter had also died, and the defining tragedy in the Wizarding World was just how many people had been killed or disabled in the first war with Voldemort and his Death-Eaters.

[mothwing.livejournal.com]

Yes, Lily was sort of alright. She even gets to do stuff! It's as though she's more than a motivator for the men in her life, almost.
And dead women - there's even a trope for that, and I wish it weren't so common.