New and Improved: Re-thinking the character of Sarah Jane Johnson

The character of Sarah Jane Johnson from Imitation of Life (Douglas Sirk, 1959) always seemed to be an angry snotty young girl. She took her anger out on her mother Annie Johnson. I never thought of her as a very likeable character. That is until a recent discussion of Imitation of Life (Sirk, 1959) when I started questioning why this young girl was so full of anger. Is it her fault that she is angry? I realized that I have been looking at her through the eyes of someone living in 2007. You have a whole different perspective if you think about how life would have been in 1959 America or 1947 America for a young African – American girl who looks white.

Richard Dyer in his chapter “Stars as Signs” talks about the character in the cinema. He states one of the qualities a character should have is the illusion of ‘life’ that the character should ‘escape’ the constructing activity of authors. (Dyer, p.105) Bernard J. Paris in his A Psychological Approach to Fiction says, “The central characters of realistic fiction should be like real people, that they should have a life of their own beyond the control of their author.” (Paris, p.9) Sarah Jane Johnson as a character does have the illusion of ‘life’ and in that life is a real world with a real history.

How does this real world of Sarah Jane Johnson, which for the purpose of this paper we will assume is America of 1947 – 1959, effect Sarah Jane’s behavior? This world is one full of racism. There is segregation and discrimination against people of color. This is not a world where a person of color can expect to achieve “The American Dream” but can expect to deal with hardship and hatred.

At the start of Imitation of Life (Sirk, 1959) we get a look into the world of Sarah Jane. She appears to people as being a little white girl but is actually the daughter of Annie Johnson, an African-American. Sarah Jane’s father is not part of her life. He left before Sarah Jane was born. According to Annie, “Sarah Jane’s daddy was practically white.” So we must assume she got her light skin from her father’s side. Annie is looking to work as a live in maid but people don’t like to take in a person with a child. Finally, we find out that Sarah Jane and Annie are homeless.

So who is to blame for Sarah Jane’s behavior? She is an angry young girl and through close analysis of Imitation of Life (Sirk, 1959) we will try to answer the above question. The scene we will closely look at to try to answer the question is the classroom scene. We will look at the mise-en-scene of this scene to try to understand Sarah Jane.

Douglas Sirk is a master of mise-en-scene. He is well known for his use of colors in his melodramas. In watching a Sirk film, you may not be able to catch all that is in the frame in a single viewing. However, Laura Mulvey is correct in her assertion that the best way to really be aware of what Douglas Sirk put in each frame of his films is to use textual analysis and go through a scene frame by frame. (Mulvey, p.230) In the classroom scene from Imitation of Life (Sirk, 1959) Sirk, through his mise-en-scene, puts the blame of Sarah Jane’s behavior on the institutionalized racism of America.

Sirk opens up the segment, chapter 6 on the DVD, containing the classroom scene by fading in from black. We hear the sound of wind blowing before we see any images. The first image we see is of an extreme close-up of a red fire hydrant with snow strategically placed on it. The fire hydrant is placed on the left hand side of the screen. In the center of the screen we see columns of a building with two people walking up the steps. There is a snowstorm going on during of all of this action. Annie Johnson is one of the people walking up the steps and the other person who happens to be a police officer is helping her. As the camera pans up with Annie going up the steps we see the building that she is going into is Public School No. 1. We then get our first cut and we are inside the classroom.



So why did Sirk decided to place a red fire hydrant so prominently into this scene? A fire hydrant is usually used to protect people by providing water during fires. It is also a symbol of government and authority. If you are talking about issues of race relations no one can forget the images of civil rights activists being hosed down by authorities using fire hoses on them during the protests and marches of the 1950’s and 1960’s.

The color red plays an important role in this scene and throughout the whole film. Red can symbolize many different meanings from anger, danger, emergency, power, love, blood, and violence. It is an attention grabbing color. It is the first color in the spectrum of colors that make up a rainbow and the first color that our eyes go to. In going through every frame of the classroom scene the color red appears in almost all frames and is scattered throughout inside each frame. In this scene we have the red fire hydrant, Annie is bringing Sarah Jane’s red boots to school, and after the classroom scene Annie and Sarah Jane are standing in front of a red Christmas tree sign. The red sign from the Christmas tree lot bleeds into the following scene with Lora and Susie in the apartment.



After the exterior shot of the school and red hydrant we cut to the classroom but instead of a shot from the front of the classroom looking directly at the students Sirk picks a different shot. Sirk shoots the classroom shot from an angle. We are looking across the room in a diagonal line. We see the back of the heads or side views of the students. We cannot pick Sarah Jane out from any of the other students in the class. She is not different or special. She is just one child indistinguishable from the others. This is Sarah Jane’s wish in life to just fit into a white world, impossible to tell her apart from the other white people. Soon Sarah Jane’s illusion will be destroyed by the appearance of her mother.

Sirk’s mise-en-scene in this classroom lets us know that this is a particular kind of institution of learning. If we follow the line that the shot of classroom is centered on we will find a Christmas tree is the middle of the chalkboard. What kind of teacher would want a Christmas tree blocking their chalkboard? However, this is where Sirk puts the tree and he has the shot set up to draw our attention directly to the tree. Not only do we have a Christmas tree in this classroom but we have a red Santa figure on the window directly left of the tree and right of the tree on the chalkboard is the different names for Santa Claus in different countries. We also have wreaths hanging from the wall and door.

The teacher is pointing out to the children the different names of Santa Claus in Holland, France, Sweden, and Germany. These are all European countries with a majority population that would have been considered Aryan, a Caucasian person of non-Semitic descent. There is no room for people in this classroom that aren’t white Christians. Sirk’s placement of the map of the United States just right of the teacher gives us the impression that there is no room in American for non-white non-Christians either. No room in white Christian America unless they are there as domestic help and don’t try to mingle with the whites like Sarah Jane is trying to do.



From the initial shot of the classroom we cut to Sarah Jane. She is sitting in her seat looking bored. She is just another child in the classroom. We cut back to a closer shot of the teacher. She is still talking about the different names of Santa Claus in different countries. We hear a knock at the door. The teacher puts down her pointer and the camera pans along with the teacher as she walks to the door. The teacher opens the door and in walks Annie Johnson. We cut to Sarah Jane who now slouches down in her desk looking around to see if any of the other students have found out her secret. Seeing that they have not she hides behind her book. She puts her book up to hide her face and hide from the view of her mother.





It is the appearance of Annie Johnson that brings fear and trepidation to Sarah Jane. She does not fear the institution or its representatives that perpetuate the discrimination against the people different from them but her own mother. She is comfortable or at least accepting in her charade of sameness. Sarah Jane Johnson wants to fit into this white world, this world of privileges. The one person who stands in her way of achieving her sameness is her mother, Annie.

The teacher stands to the left of Annie blocking her from the students and entering any further into her classroom. We just see the back of the teacher’s head. Annie is smiling and trying to be polite, non-threatening, but her smile disappears when the teacher tells her “she has no colored girls in her classroom.” Annie tries to look around the teacher into the classroom searching for her daughter. There is a cut and then we see Sarah Jane looking around from her book. Another cut back to Annie now recognizing Sarah Jane behind the book. We cut back to Sarah Jane back to hiding behind her book.

The scene cuts back to the teacher, who now turns to look at Sarah Jane, and Annie. Annie walks in front of the teacher and they switch positions with Annie on the left and the now dumb struck teacher on the right. Annie starts walking towards Sarah Jane holding Sarah’s red boots. The camera follows Annie but then suddenly stops before Annie gets to Sarah Jane. The camera moves from Annie to the girl in front of Sarah Jane. We just see Sarah Jane’s hands and her book on the far left of the screen. We go to a close-up of Sarah Jane hiding behind the book and Annie’s hand on the top of the book.



Sarah Jane gets up and runs out of the classroom. The camera does not follow Sarah Jane but stays at her desk and we see her running out in a long shot. In a moment from this shot we see Annie standing by Sarah Jane’s desk with the image of the map of the United States between her and Sarah Jane. This is a telling moment in the film because it is the institutionalized racism of the 1940’s and 1950’s America that has separated this mother from her daughter. Sarah Jane can pass for white, live among them, enjoy the privileges they have, and circumnavigate the obstacles her race would cause her otherwise. Annie cannot pass. She is doomed to her fate and place in society because of her color. Sarah Jane can never escape what position her race places her in a society that is racist as long as people know Annie is Sarah Jane’s mother.



Annie follows Sarah Jane out of the classroom. The camera is still in the location of the desk and not following Annie. We see Annie go out of the classroom in a long shot. Just before Annie leaves the classroom we see her in the middle between the map and the flag of the United States. She is trapped in her situation in this racist country with little or no hope to change how her life will be. Annie loves her daughter and wants the best for her but does not want her to lie about her ethnicity.



After both Annie and Sarah Jane leave the school building they run into a Christmas tree lot. As with the red fire hydrant at the beginning of this scene we now have a red sign with white lettering in the left hand corner of the frame. The sign says, “XMAS TREES” below this it says, “Special Orders”. They are both standing next to the sign as Annie tells Sarah Jane that she should of told them she was African American. Sarah Jane is standing in front of the sign so the word ‘special’ is to the left of her. She is special. She can enter this special world of white Christian society. No one would know she was African American by looking at her. She wants to take advantage of this fact but will never be able to if they knew her mother was African American. She is cursed by something she had no control over. She cannot help the fact that she looks white. Also, she cannot help it that she is actually African American.




Sarah Jane tells Annie she wishes she were dead. She curses the fact that Annie is her mother. Annie on her knees helping Sarah put on her scarf tells Sarah that there is nothing wrong with being who she is. Sarah should be proud of her ethnicity. The snow is melting on Annie’s face during this scene and it makes her look like she is crying. She is broken hearted that her daughter is in pain over her ethnicity and so willing to deny it. Sarah Jane runs off and Annie gets up to leave, the scene then dissolves into the next scene.
We can still see the Xmas tree sign as the scene changes to Lora and Susie on Susie’s bed. Lora is holding a thermometer having just checked Susie’s temperature. Looking at the thermometer Lora says to Susie, “Your practically normal.” We hear the sound of the door opening up. It’s Annie and Sarah Jane returning home. Sarah Jane can only wish she was ‘practically normal’.