Her character was oddly unlikable in The Stepfather
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Jill Schoelen
SimplemindedSociety — 15 years ago(March 21, 2011 12:25 AM)
As the protaganist, it threw the film off balance. Her character was the sympathetic one, but she was not likable in order to play the victim to the degree that was intended.
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PseudoFilmCritic — 15 years ago(March 21, 2011 10:36 AM)
I am not sure what you mean. She was likable and a bit of a rebel, and a hint of Nancy Drew in her. She did not like her stepfatherhow can you blame her for that?
http://jerrysaravia.blogspot.com/2011/01/strength-vitality-and-allure- of-jill.html
Films are not reality. Reality is not film. Film is only an approximation of reality. -
SimplemindedSociety — 15 years ago(March 21, 2011 10:46 AM)
She disliked him without giving him a chance. Wouldn't it had been more interesting if she liked him in the beginning,only to make that transition when her detective work panned out?
Or was the point of the story to show that she could 'sense' his true colors without getting to know him?
p.s Shelly Hack was bad in this(as usual) -
BoSoxRule — 15 years ago(March 21, 2011 01:26 PM)
"Or was the point of the story to show that she could 'sense' his true colors without getting to know him?"
I believe that was the point, yes. She just knew something was off about him from the outset.
I'm happiestin the saddle. -
PseudoFilmCritic — 15 years ago(March 21, 2011 10:52 PM)
Stephanie was not blind like her mother. I don't think Hack was bad in this film at all - she played the blind, understanding wife perfectly.
http://jerrysaravia.blogspot.com/2011/01/strength-vitality-and-allure- of-jill.html
Films are not reality. Reality is not film. Film is only an approximation of reality. -
SimplemindedSociety — 15 years ago(March 22, 2011 09:21 AM)
'Stephanie was not blind like her mother. I don't think Hack was bad in this film at all - she played the blind, understanding wife perfectly.'
Hack did not deliver her lines well: "he's your father, and you'll respect himmmm"!!! Maybe the scene on the phone was ok, but that's about it. Even the climax with her shaking the gun was awkward. I just don't think she's an actress.
Stephanie had nothing tangible to go on until she witnessed him going psycho in the basement tool- room. Prior to that,it seemed like a personality clash,thinking he was dork, or intuition that something is 'strange' about him; the same things that most kids feel when a new parent enters the family(she called him a creep as I remember when he told her BF to leave). However, being strange doesn't make one a killer. -
desperadodave79-177-212918 — 11 years ago(March 16, 2015 12:51 PM)
A teenager that dislikes their stepparent. Nope that NEVER happens in real life.
Maybe in your world of Mayberry teenagers aren't like that. But the good portion will at first have a dislike of someone their mother/father is dating married to.
Its actually a very simple concept. -
fiatlux-1 — 14 years ago(July 29, 2011 11:37 PM)
I found her a little unlikeable too. I could see her not liking him because she sensed he was a nut, but like others mentioned it seemed it was because it was someone who was not her real dad.
I could almost understand that, but she seemed to jump to him being the killer much too quickly.
Even after seeing my stepfather yell and pound things in the basement, I wouldn't think he was a killer. Psycho maybe, hehe, but not a killer.
"I'd say this cloud is Cumulo Nimbus."
"Didn't he discover America?"
"Penfold, shush." -
SimplemindedSociety — 14 years ago(July 29, 2011 11:54 PM)
She was very remote(had an attitude) when the protagonist has to be a sympathetic character. Even though Jerry was annoying, he could never do right by her.
However, I don't think she suspected he was a killer until the very end. Remember when her doctor was killed and Jerry consoled her; that was towards the end ,I think. -
HenryCW — 14 years ago(March 21, 2012 07:47 AM)
Stephanie (Jill's character) suspected the Stepfather to be the killer that the police was after
very early
in the film. If you remember, she even wrote to obtain a photo of the killer. The Stepfather took away the picture from the envelope and substituted the picture of that Charles Bronson lookalike and so Stephanie thought she was wrong about him. You might say she disliked her stepfather and so invented bad things in her mind about him. But she was proved to be right and so what can we say? Perhaps he did often behave very oddly (like yelling at himself while alone as seen in the film) and so aroused her suspicions that he was not "normal"?
I think she was a sympathetic character in the film. The mother and daughter still felt bad about the father's death. She was having troubles in school and in the film we know that she fought with another girl and was suspended for a while. That was why she had to go for those sessions with the psychiatrist. But overall she was a nice and likable person. One could easily imagine her uneasiness and fear having this strange guy living in the same house.