A Melodramatic Failure in All That Heaven Allows

Abstract

While examining female liberation and agency in Douglas Sirk’s All That Heaven Allows, this essay furthers the work of Thomas Elsasser and Elizabeth R. Anker to elucidate the ways in which Sirk diverges from melodramatic conventions in the cinematic narrative structure. Moreover, this essay points out the inherent flaw of the melodramatic narrative structure of women’s films. This flaw essentially shows that the suffering female protagonist succeeds in freeing herself by finding a new home, a place of freedom, only to fail in the end because she already knows the reality/the real ending about her inescapable fate. Sirk criticizes the ideological system that shapes and influences gender relations rather than an individual villain. The system that Sirk critiques is one in which women are allowed to transgress and revolt against the assumed oppressor but are simultaneously trained to act docile and accept the supposed inevitable failure of her revolt.