Steel Magnolias

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Steel Magnolias is a 1989 Dramedy film starring Sally Field, Shirley MacLaine, Olympia Dukakis, Dolly Parton, Daryl Hannah, and Julia Roberts.

Tropes used in Steel Magnolias include:
  • Beauty Inversion: The producers told Daryl Hannah they weren't sure she could play Annelle, saying she was too attractive. She showed up for her audition looking as frumpy as she could, and the security guard wouldn't let her in because he didn't recognize her.
  • Birth-Death Juxtaposition
  • Blasphemous Boast: Ouiser tells Shelby that "The only reason people are nice to me is because I have more money than God."
  • Chatty Hairdresser: Truvy.
  • Converse with the Unconscious: M'Lynn talks to her daughter trying to get her to wake up from her diabetic coma. She ultimately dies.
  • Fan Service: The "colour announcer" scene... which just happened to be in a sports team's changing room, and thus meant the appearance of several naked men.
  • Fashion Hurts: Truvy has this to say about shoes: "In a good shoe, I wear a size six, but a seven feels so good, I buy a size eight." Meaning she's a size eight but will squeeze down to a six for the right shoe.
  • "Happy Holidays" Dress: The "Miss Merry Christmas" wears a long, red dress with a white faux fur neckline and muff.
  • Misplaced Names Poster: Six names, none of which are over the person to which they belong.
  • Mood Whiplash: My'Lynn shouting at her daughter's funeral is turned comedic when Clairee says that My'Lynn should hit Ouiser to feel better.
  • Pitbull Dates Puppy: Owen and Ouiser. He doesn't seem to mind, though.
  • Please Wake Up: A prolonged version of this occurs when M'Lynn Eatonton is trying to rouse Shelby when she's in the hospital after her final diabetic episode. Not long after, she's taken off life support.
  • Slice of Life: A lot of scenes are basically this, fitting a theme directly mentioned near the end, that "Life goes on".