At the beginning of Jill Godmilow’s 1987 film WAITING FOR THE MOON GertrudeandAlice, played by Linda Bassett and Linda Hunt, are sitting in the garden of their country home proofreading a manuscript. This was probably not an uncommon scene in their lives. What makes the film’s opening shot so unusual is that there is a crying baby in the picture.
Linda Bassett and Linda Hunt in WAITING FOR THE MOON
When I first saw the movie when it was released, I assumed that the child was Hemingway’s son and that GertrudeandAlice were babysitting. It was not until the DVD version of the film came out a few years ago with a director’s interview as an added feature that I learned the baby was supposed to be GertrudeandAlice’s child.
Ms. Godmilow says in the interview that since it is impossible to make an historically accurate, biographical film about famous people, a film may include any incidents or characters which tell the story the way the filmmaker wants to present it. In this case GertrudeandAlice have a baby. (The film was criticized for its historical inaccuracies, but that’s another blog.)
Children and GertrudeandAlice, however, seem to fit.
