Movie-A-Day #116: Imitation of Life (1959).

Today is the birthday of Douglas Sirk, the director who spent the 1950s making some of cinema’s most florid, psychologically intense melodramas. His remake of “Imitation of Life” was his last American movie before a 20-year retirement from filmmaking, and also one of his most memorable. Lana Turner plays a struggling white actress who shares a house with Juanita Moore, a black widow, and together they go through an occasionally racially charged series of ups and downs with their rebellious daughters. It’s a weepie, so make sure you have plenty of tissues handy.