Citizen Ruth (1996)

Film: Citizen Ruth (1996)

Stars: Laura Dern, Swoosie Kurtz, Kurtwood Smith, Mary Kay Place, Kelly Preston, MC Gainey, Tippi Hedren, Burt Reynolds

Director: Alexander Payne

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2021 Saturdays with the Stars series, we highlight a different one Alfred Hitchcock's Leading Ladies.  This month, our focus is on Tippi Hedren-click here to learn more about Ms. Hedren (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

After Roar, Tippi Hedren occasionally made films, but largely settled into a world outside of proper stardom, working definitely but never in serious projects.  She made appearances on TV shows (including Hart to Hart and Chicago Hope), and worked alongside her daughter a couple of times.  She made a cameo in The Birds II, which she later regretted doing, and had a memorable role in David O. Russell's I Heart Huckabees.  She also had a small part in yet another significant director's career.  While with Chaplin, Hedren got a much-discussed (within the film) character who ends up a cameo in A Countess from Hong Kong, the director's final film, we saw the inverse in Citizen Ruth, where Hedren plays a much-discussed (within the film) character in the first movie of an Oscar-nominated director, Alexander Payne.  Today we're going to close out our month-long look at Tippi Hedren with a peak into this movie, which announced the career of the man who would make Election, Sideways, and Nebraska.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is the story of Ruth Stoops (Dern), a mother of four with substance abuse problems who becomes pregnant with a man she barely knows in the opening scenes of the movie.  After finding out she's pregnant, she's scolded by a judge, who recommends that she get an abortion to avoid jail time.  When Norm (Smith) & Gail (Place) find out about this, they tell their anti-abortion group & start to sponsor Ruth's life, insisting she have a baby.  Ruth initially doesn't like this, and nearly gets the abortion when it turns out one of the members of the group, Diane (Kurtz) is actually a pro-choice advocate in disguise, but when each group offers her $15,000 to go through with the decision, she is caught in a national firestorm over whether or not she should have the child, bringing in major leaders of both sides (played by Reynolds & Hedren).  When Ruth, in the middle of a drunken stupor, miscarries, she ends up tricking them into giving her the money, running away from the spotlight with little resolution as to what happens next.

Citizen Ruth is a biting commentary, and one that doesn't shy away from skewering both sides of this political hot button.  One would assume that the anti-abortion crowd would be rife for a politically liberal director like Payne, but he's just as ruthless in taking on the pro-choice group, particularly the way that neither side is particularly interested in what Ruth wants, seeing her as an easy pawn in this debate.  Dern plays Ruth perfectly so that the audience struggles to have sympathy for her.  It's clear from the onset that Ruth would make a horrible mother (she has far too many personal demons to responsibly take care of a child), and that she won't be able to carry this baby to term without doing drugs, putting the child at risk...but no one seems all that interested in that reality.  The film is perhaps too broad at times (Ruth doesn't show a lot of personal growth, and while that might be in-character, it hurts the script which is asking for some growth in her), but it's fascinating, pull-no-punches stuff from a debate that oftentimes feels like everyone is coming with no understanding for the other side's position.

Tippi Hedren, like many of her films post-Hitchcock, only gets a small part here.  She and Reynolds are both fun as late-breaking movie stars brought in to add a certain cache to the debate.  We don't need background from these figures, and Payne knows it-the audience understands that these genuine celebrities (in real life) translate their personas in this world onscreen.  As a result, though, I leave Hedren's month a bit melancholy.  The actress gave two incredible performances onscreen for Hitchcock, and while she worked with major directors afterward, it's fair to say she never really escaped his shadow, and certainly never made anything as good as The Birds and Marnie.  Considering the truly horrible nature of their relationship (based on Hedren's later statements), this is a pity for such a distinctive star.  Next month we will finish off our year devoted to Hitchcock with one last leading lady, one who would be something of an antithesis to many of the women we've discussed this season (and the Hitchcock prototype).