While watching this film I found myself really captivated by Marlene Dietrich’s role of Helen Faraday in Blonde Venus. Throughout the entire movie she is a mother thinking of her child and her husband Ned (Herbert Marshall). In my opinion, she is a strong woman who is capable of doing what is necessary to take care of her loved ones whether that be husband and child, or herself.  In the beginning of the film she is working to for herself, and later in the film she takes up her job once more to get enough money to send her husband for treatment. When she is on the run, she is still finding ways to provide shelter and food for her son, Johnny (“Dickie” Moore). And after they have taken everything away from her, she rises even higher than before  as a performer in Paris.

In many other movies, when a woman is forced to be a single mother or is facing continuing difficulties, she has a break down moment. That or the child grows up very fast for his age in order to help the mother. Neither happens in this movie because Helen keeps her professional life separate from her personal life. The Blonde Venus on stage is a completely separate woman from Helen, mother of Johnny. Even though her job is very time consuming, she still finds time to help Johnny learn how to read and write, and she is not biased with his education (she teaches him the word father despite how Ned has been treating her). Helen also takes the newspaper away from Johnny when he asks if it is her picture and we can assume she continued to remove these pictures from his sight because in the end of the movie he does not recognize her picture when Ned shows the little boy her headline as Paris’ new star. Helen was a mother who was able to take the bottom of the barrel without complaining. Not once did she whine about her situation, or the difficulties she faced. She knew that she brought these hardships upon herself, but she would not let that affect Johnny’s outlook on life. She never told her son the truth about why they changed homes all the time. And when she had to wash the dishes to pay for her meal, she told Johnny that she is going to show him “a big kitchen”.  When she reveals herself to the detective and Ned arrives to take Johnny away, she tells her son that she will not go back with them, but she will go “tomorrow”, forever keeping the harsh reality from her son.  Although Helen and Ned’s relationship is still rocky at the end of the movie, it is clear that her love for Johnny never left and that she is willing to try again with Ned if he will take her back. Although the integrity and dignity of her character may be questionable, it is certain that she is a mother who is willing to do any and everything to have the best for her loved ones.