F/F Movie Spankings

blimp
In the Tom Brown one he was definitely padded and he assumed a rather strange position over another boy's back. Apparently his (real) mother had to be (and was) convinced that no pain was involved but winced at every blow.

As you say, the Happy Valley scenes were awesome!

Many years ago, one of Nu-West's non-glossy corporal punishment magazines printed the mother/daughter spanking exerpt from the original novel; IIRC it was bare hand to bare bottom and fairly intensive, not like the brief, moderate over-the-skirt spanking scene in the HBO adaptation.

The publication also had a very appealing illustration of the scene, which presented it as somewhat more erotic than the written passage did--it was done in black and white), as was the entire magazine (sepia cover), but both mother and daughter were shown as quite attractive.

The daughter did seem to hold a rather bizarre belief that 'class pride' was more important than mundane things such as food, clothing and shelter... --C.K.

I was able to track down the book version of the spanking. The filmed version not only lacks most of the scene but much of the drama around it.

No, I didn't go out and buy the book just for the passage: Back in June 2005, Bared Affair published a review of that scene in Mildred Pierce. It was written by Angie Heart (Editrix in Chief). I haven't been able to find this review online, so here's a sample of it. Just the "setting the scene" and "extract" part" - you'll have to track down the original to get Angie Heart's feelings on the book.


The Scene

It is 1931 in Glendale (Southern California), U.S.A. The Great Depression is taking a toll on everyone. Mildred, in her early thirties, is now a single mother – she threw her husband out of the house in the opening scene. Veda is perhaps 13 years old. Now that her husband is gone, Mildred has been forced to take a job as a waitress at a local hash house, to ensure that she can pay the bills. (There are no other jobs out there, especially for a girl who married as a teenager and hasn't worked since.) Mildred is afraid of the shame if her haughty older daughter finds out that she is a waitress, so she keeps it a secret from the family. But Veda discovers her hidden waitress uniform and makes the family maid, Letty, wear it as they go to the pool. Needless to say, Mildred has neither dismissed her maid nor cut back on other material goods despite having no money to speak of – she wants her daughters to have every material advantage she can possibly provide.

In forcing Letty to wear the uniform, Mildred intuits that this is actually Veda's attempt to shame her mother into giving up the job – even though neither Mildred nor Veda have yet acknowledged that Veda knows she's a waitress. Mildred puts her younger daughter Ray to bed and resolves to deal with Veda, who is dressed in a kimono and panties as nightwear.


The Extract

James M. Caine, Mildred Pierce, published in 1941. Pages 240-1 from "Three Complete Novels by James M. Caine."


When they got to the den, Mildred closed the door, sat down in the armchair, and stood Veda in front of her. "Why did you give [the maid] Letty that uniform?"

"For heaven's sake, Mother, haven't I told you once? How often do I have to tell you? I won't have you questioning me this way. Good night – I'm going to bed."

Mildred caught her arm, pulled her back. "You knew, when you gave it to Letty, that that was my uniform, didn't you?"

"Your uniform?"

Veda's simulation of surprise was so cool, so calculated, so insolent, that Mildred waited longer than she usually did, when angered. Then she went on: "I've taken a job as a waitress in a restaurant in Hollywood."

"As a – what?"

"As a waitress, as you very well know."

"Yee gods! Yee – "

Mildred clipped her on the cheek, but she gave a short laugh, and brazenly finished – "gods and little fishes!"


At this, Mildred clipped her a terrific wallop on the other cheek,that toppled her to the floor. As she lay there, Mildred began to talk. "So you and your sister can eat, and have a place to sleep, and a few clothes on your backs. I've taken the only kind of a job I could get, and if you think I'm going to listen to a lot of silly nonsense from you about it, you're mistaken. And if you think your nonsense is going to make me give up the job, you're mistaken about that, too. How you found out what I was doing I don't know – "

"From the uniform, stupid. You think I'm dumb?"

Mildred clipped her again, and went on: "You may not realize it, but everything you have costs money, from the maid that you ordered to go traipsing with you to the pool, to your food, and everything else that you have. And as I don't see anybody else doing anything about it – "

Veda had got up now, her eyes hard, and cut in:

"Aren't the pies bad enough? Did you have to degrade us by – "

Mildred caught her by both arms, threw her over one knee, whipped the kimono up with one motion, the panties down with another, and brought her bare hand down on Veda's bottom with all the force her fury could give her. Veda screamed and bit her leg. Mildred pulled loose, then beat the rapidly reddening bottom until she was exhausted, and Veda screamed as though there were demons inside her. Then Mildred let Veda slide to the floor, and sat there panting and fighting the nausea that was swelling in her stomach.

Presently Veda got up, staggered to the sofa, and flung herself down in tragic despair. Then she gave a soft laugh, and whispered, in sorrow rather than in anger: "A waitress."

Mildred now began to cry. She rarely struck Veda, telling Mrs. Gessler that "the child didn't need it," and that she "didn't believe in beating children for every little thing." But this wasn't the real reason. The few times she had tried spanking, she had got exactly nowhere. She couldn't break Veda, now matter how much she slapped her. Veda got victory out of these struggles, she a trembling, ignoble defeat.

It always came back to the same thing. She was afraid of Veda, of her snobbery, her contempt, her unbreakable spirit. And she was afraid of something that seemed always lurking under Veda's bland, phony toniness: a cold, cruel, coarse desire to torture her mother, to humiliate her, above everything else, to hurt her. Mildred apparently yearned for warm affection from this child, such as Bert apparently commanded. But all she ever got was stagy, affected counterfeit. This half loaf she had to accept, trying not to see it for what it really was.