… SPOILERS - kills himself on that boat?
I am aware that his life has been on the downside and that his wife was no longer in a loving relationship with him and perhaps some aspects of his business wasn't going as well as he hoped. But still, why take one's life over all of this or even any of it?
Cheers.
To this day, I feel like it came out of left field.
However, I've had three decades' life experience since then, and while I still think it wasn't properly telegraphed in the film, it's not inconceivable.
Smart people often struggle with depression, especially when their brains lead them to cynicism, and from there, it's not a large leap to deciding it's just not worth going on. Worse, when you "know" how smart you are, you'll tend to trust your own judgment when deciding it's time to end it.
Anthony Bourdain comes to mind.
So it's no longer ridiculous to me, but a better screenplay would've given us a few clues beforehand.
"Harold & Maude," for example, pretty much telegraphed Maude's plans from the outset and, more importantly, gave us a nice, long look at her concentration camp tattoo. Nothing more needed to be said.
It wasn't just that "some aspects of his business wasn't going as well as he hoped", he blew the money. All of it. He married a rich woman and blew all her money in bad, most likely reckless and stupid investments. She didn't know that yet but she and all her friends and business contacts would soon find out. She thought Doug was brilliant but now she lost everything. That was hanging over his head.
But it was worse. Before he married his wife, he thought his mediocre way through life at that point was just bad circumstance and that he was smarter and more clever than most folks - Coughlin's Laws and all that. With just a bit of a break, he'd rule the world.
Well, not only did he blow all the money, he now knew his whole opinion of his intelligence was garbage and he was truly a fraud the whole time.
That's a pretty good take.
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