History Film / WhiteOleander

''White Oleander'' is 2000 drama film directed by [[Series/ThePromise Peter Kosminsky]]. The cast features Creator/AlisonLohman in the central role of Astrid Magnussen, and Creator/MichellePfeiffer as her temperamental mother Ingrid, alongside Creator/RobinWright, Creator/ReneeZellweger and Creator/BillyConnolly in supporting roles.

''White Oleander'' is 2000 drama film directed by Peter Kosminsky. The cast features Creator/AlisonLohman in the central role of Astrid Magnussen, and Creator/MichellePfeiffer as her temperamental mother Ingrid, alongside Creator/RobinWright, Creator/ReneeZellweger and Creator/BillyConnolly in supporting roles.

** Claire, having very low self-esteem, no personal boundaries and being co-dependent, probably comes from an abusive home as well. Also Starr breaks Davey’s arm when she is too drunk, though she regrets it later. If you think about it, this book is about all sorts of abusive parents and how not to raise a child.

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Ray, Starr's boyfriend, goes from a graying, overweight, 50-ish carpenter who is missing three fingers in the novel to a 30-ish(at most) rugged pretty boy played by Cole Hauser in the film. Paul Trout might be this as well, as he is explicitly stated to be ugly in the novel, and he's played by Patrick Fugit in the film.

* AlcoholicParent: Starr is this to her biological children and an [[AlcoholicParent Alcoholic Foster Parent]] to Astrid and the other kids she fosters. She starts out in recovery, but goes off the rails when she thinks Astrid is sleeping with Ray. Claire shows shades of this in the novel toward the end of her appearance, since a bottle of sherry never leaves her side during Astrid's final weeks there.

* AllGirlsWantBadBoys: Pretty much why Astrid [[spoiler:slept with Sergei]] in the novel. She grows out of it.

* BastardBoyfriend: Ron, Claire’s husband, is a subtle variety. On the outside he loves her and does his best to provide for their posh lifestyle, though Astrid sees that he is always making all the decisions, emotionally hurts Claire and later blames it on her, and is implied to be cheating on Claire when on business trips. Astrid states several times that Ron never cared to know the real Claire and only wanted her to play the part of a happy wife without bothering him too much.

** Also implied in regards to [[spoiler:Ingrid's]] mother in the novel: there's a throwaway line toward the end about [[spoiler:Ingrid's]] mother drowning in the cow pond when she was thirteen. It's not elaborated on or mentioned in detail, but it's very chilling when you think about it.

* GratuitousForeignLanguage: the novel has a lot of this, bordering on BilingualBonus. Astrid uses several languages in one line, during the scene where [[spoiler:she and Nikki go to the museum after dropping acid.]] Among others, we have:

* HandsOffParenting : what Ingrid practices as she hates to limit her own freedom in any way. As a result Astrid only felt what it meant to be loved thanks to Claire.

* KarmaHoudini: Starr [[spoiler:possibly gets away with shooting Astrid in the novel, since she runs off, though both novel and film have elements of a WhatHappenedToTheMouse situation]]. In the novel, Amelia Ramos [[spoiler:gets away with starving the girls she fosters, though Astrid gets out]]. Ingrid [[spoiler:ultimately gets away with murder in the novel. It's only insinuated she does the same in the film]].

* ParentalAbandonment: In spades. Astrid's dad is a DisappearedDad, Ingrid is eventually Astrid's MissingMom([[spoiler:twice: First when she left Astrid with a babysitter for a year when she was much younger, and the prison stint is the second time]]), and [[spoiler:Astrid's foster mother Claire, the one she admits she loved the most, commits suicide after her husband leaves her.]]
** Also implied as part of [[spoiler:Ingrid's]] backstory in the novel: [[spoiler: her mother drowned in the cowpond when Ingrid was thirteen in a possible suicide, and while little is mentioned of Ingrid's father, Ingrid tells Astrid that she (Astrid) is lucky not to have a father, so it's possible Ingrid's father may have abandoned her as well, even if it was only in an emotional sense following the death of Ingrid's mother.]]
* ParentalNeglect: Ingrid to Astrid, culiminating with leaving her in the care of a babysitter for a year.

* PragmaticAdaptation: Upping Astrid's age (presumably due to the Ray subplot) and removing three foster homes: the group home on Crenshaw Boulevard because nothing plot relevant really happens, The home of Amelia Ramos (presumably because what Amelia does to the girls in the home would have upped the rating) and the Turlocks (presumably because Marvel's racism would have driven the film's rating up, to say nothing of [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Astrid's drug use, Astrid giving a boy in a park a blowjob in exchange for weed, and Astrid's friendship with a prostitute who lives next door to the Turlocks]]).
* ReallyGetsAround: Ingrid before Barry and prison, though it's portrayed positively and seems like more of a twisted EthicalSlut situation (justified, as it's seen though Astrid's eyes and at that point, Astrid worshiped her mother). Astrid weaves in and out of this through the novel.

* SatelliteLoveInterest: In the novel, Paul Trout is into comics and Astrid, and that's about it, even after [[spoiler:she leaves California and lives with him]]. He's given a little more to do in the film, but not much.

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Somewhat of a JustifiedTrope, since Astrid is in foster care. However, [[spoiler:Starr shooting Astrid]] is a very jarring example- it's never mentioned after Astrid leaves the home (and you think it would be, since y'know, [[spoiler:the main character just got shot!]], but it's not a large enough incident (in terms of the scope of the novel and film, both of which are pretty vast for their mediums) to constitute AbortedArc.
** It's a throwaway line in the novel, but [[spoiler:while Astrid is recovering from the shooting in the hospital, a plainclothes police officer says that they got Starr when they caught her sneaking in trying to visit (said she was visiting her sister) and berate Astrid for making up a story about burglars in order to protect Starr when she's not even her real mother. No mention of a trial or sentencing, but she was arrested. Astrid only lied for Davey's (Starr's biological son) sake.]]

* AbusiveParents: Ingrid qualifies as emotionally abusive. The foster parents also qualify for physical abuse. Arguably, Astrid also suffers sexual abuse at Ray's hands, though he is not technically her foster parent (just her foster mother's boyfriend) and Astrid is consenting though underage.

* BitchInSheepsClothing: Astrid notices that Ingrid likes to present herself either as a hero or a victim in her poems but never a culprit.

* YourCheatingHeart: Claire adamantly believes that Ron is having an affair, and it is hinted that here she may be in fact right.

* AdultsAreUseless: as the book is written from Astrid’s point of view, who is a teenager when the story starts, one can be surprised how little love, help and care she gets from all the adults around her. She often ends up caring for other people or gets exploited while being in great need of care herself. She has to watch over her mother and Claire when they get too depressed, is forced to babysit and perform all sorts of menial tasks at one of the foster homes while recovering from a bullet wound, is intentionally starved by a woman who only takes in foster kids for money. And when Astrid gets to the youth detention center we realize her story may be just a tip of an iceberg...

* HandsOffParenting : what Ingrid practices as she hates to limit her own freedom in any way. As a result Astrid only felt what it means to be loved thanks to Claire.

* Housewife: Claire doesn’t have a career or even get parts often though she is a talented actress. It is implied that she is too broken and cannot handle the stress, even though she enjoys show business.

* ExtremeDoormat: Claire has no boundaries, cannot say no to a old dirty bum she meets in the street and never defends herself even from her husband Ron, who is disrespectful and condescending towards her and she has every right to be angry. Even Astrid, who loves her, is disgusted with this at some point, though she dearly regrets it later.

** Clare, having very low self-esteem, no personal boundaries and being co-dependent, probably comes from an abusive home as well. Also Starr breaks Davey’s arm when she is too drunk, though she regrets it later. If you think about it, this book is about all sorts of abusive parents and how not to raise a child.

* BastardBoyfriend: Ron, Claire’s husband, is a subtle variety. On the outside he loves her and does his best to provide for their posh lifestyle, though Astrid sees that he is always making all the decisions, emotionally hurts Claire and later blames it on her, and is implied to be cheating on Claire when on business trips.
* BirdsOfAFeather: Astrid and Paul, both being orphans and naturally gifted artists. When Astrid contemplates joining her mother after she is released from prison, she feels that she can’t leave Paul as he is not only her boyfriend, he is her.

* Happily married: what Ron and Claire look like on the outside. In reality, they have a toxic relationship, with severely depressed Claire and her manipulative, always absent husband who clearly doesn’t have a lot of respect for her, neither as a person nor as an actress.

[[quoteright:250:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/white_oleander_9217.jpg]]

''White Oleander'' (2002) is an American motion picture drama directed by Peter Kosminsky. The cast features Creator/AlisonLohman in the central role of Astrid Magnussen, and Creator/MichellePfeiffer as her temperamental mother Ingrid, alongside Creator/RobinWright, Creator/ReneeZellweger and Creator/BillyConnolly in supporting roles.

''White Oleander'' (2002) is an American motion picture drama directed by Peter Kosminsky. The cast features Creator/AlisonLohman in the central role of Astrid Magnussen, and Creator/MichellePfeiffer as her temperamental mother Ingrid, alongside Creator/RobinWright, Creator/ReneeZellweger, Creator/BillyConnolly and Creator/PatrickFugit in supporting roles.

'''''White Oleander''''' (2002) is an American motion picture drama directed by Peter Kosminsky. The cast features AlisonLohman in the central role of Astrid Magnussen, and MichellePfeiffer as her temperamental mother Ingrid, alongside RobinWrightPenn, RenéeZellweger, Creator/BillyConnolly and PatrickFugit in supporting roles.

Young Astrid is very close to her single mother, Ingrid (Michelle Pfieffer) whose free-spirited, semi-man-hating lifestyle is all well and good until Ingrid meets and eventually poisons Barry Kolker, a man who romances and then spurns Ingrid. When Astrid's mother goes to prison for the murder, Astrid is left bouncing around foster care and increasingly wondering if her mother's parenting was really very good in the first place. She lives with all different types of families from Born-again Christians to posh to a youth detention center. As she grows older, she recognizes how her mother's manipulative personality has caused her most all of her life's grief. She is forced to really soul search and is left with more questions than answers, including why her mother committed the murder.

** Also implied in regards to [[spoiler:Ingrid's]] mother in the novel: there's a throwaway line toward the end about [[spoiler:Ingrid's]] mother drowning in the cow pond when [[spoiler:Ingrid]] was thirteen. It's not elaborated on or mentioned in detail, but it's very chilling when you think about it.

* DawsonCasting: In the film, Astrid goes from 15 to 18, and was played by then 22 year old Alison Lohman.

* MultipleChoicePast: part of the reason Astrid confronts Ingrid.

* ParentalNeglect: Ingrid to Astrid.

* ParentsAsPeople: Ingrid.

* NorseMythology: Astrid and Ingrid mention this a bit in the novel. Since they're Scandinavian, it makes sense.

* SympatheticCriminal: Ingrid is apparently this to her many devotees.

* FreudWasRight: See below under ParentalIncest.

'''''White Oleander''''' (2002) is an American motion picture drama directed by Peter Kosminsky. The cast features AlisonLohman in the central role of Astrid Magnussen, and MichellePfeiffer as her temperamental mother Ingrid, alongside RobinWrightPenn, RenéeZellweger, BillyConnolly and PatrickFugit in supporting roles.

* WhiteHairedPrettyGirl: Astrid's hair is so blonde as to border on this.

* EveryoneLovesBlondes: Astrid and three/four out of six mothers (Ingrid, Starr, Marvel (book character), and Claire (Film only, in the novel she was brunette and looked like [[AudreyHepburn Audrey Hepburn]]).

* ShallowLoveInterest: In the novel, Paul Trout is into comics and Astrid, and that's about it, even after [[spoiler:she leaves California and lives with him]]. He's given a little more to do in the film, but not much.

* HairOfGold: Other characters make a lot of fuss about Ingrid and Astrid's hair in the novel.

* PragmaticAdaptation: Upping Astrid's age (presumably due to the Ray subplot) and removing two foster homes: the group home on Crenshaw Boulevard because nothing plot relevant really happens, and the Turlocks (presumably because Marvel's racism would have driven the film's rating up, to say nothing of [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Astrid's drug use, Astrid giving a boy in a park a blowjob in exchange for weed, and Astrid's friendship with a prostitute who lives next door to the Turlocks]]).