The Whole of Life
This page avoids major plot turns, twists, and ending details. It’s designed to help first-time viewers decide if this movie is right for them.What counts as a spoiler can vary by viewer.
Barbara, a fifty-year-old lesbian whose lifespan has taken her through correction homes, mental hospitals, prisons and bouts of prostitution, approached Bruno Moll suggesting that she made a film of her life. Moll agrees and hires an actress, Serena Way. To interpret episodes in Barbara’s past. Barbara has in mind a Hollywood-style bio starring an actress on the order of Susan Hayward dramatically telling her story of a life ruined by bourgeois standards. The result is a semi-documentary mixing black and white segments of Barbara and Serena discussing the project with color scenes depicting little stories from the 1950’s, the heyday of bourgeois existence.