The behavior which caused her to hate Call was Gus'. Call did nothing wrong. So her hatred was misplaced.
Call himself, in book and film, KNOWS he deserves Clara's anger. It isn't about Clara being mean to Call. It's about her calling him out on his own failings where they affected his son (failings Gus saw all their lives, and that were in the book AND film).
Call's stubbornness, his in ability to allow himself weakness or tenderness, led to a woman he truly cared for (Maggie) dying of heartbreak. All because he was embarrassed at his own human weakness and embarrassment. He was so stubborn even after that, that he abandoned Newt to poverty and destitution and it took him YEARS to bring the boy Newt to his outfit (and Gus was primarily responsible for that too). Where Call then treated Newt like an overworked hired hand and showed him no tenderness and very little kindness. Gus was the one who was sweet and kind. Then Jake Spoon was nice to him briefly, and the boy held onto it forever as a memory.
In short, Call was a
terrible father/foster father. He was a good friend to Gus. But he just couldn't seem to let anyone else in.
I mean, did Call embrace Newt, adopt him, and give him his name, show him love? Nope. He treated Newt -- a sweet, smart, lovable and polite young boy any father would be proud of -- like nothing. Like a brutally disposable hired hand who could be fired at any moment.
The fact that Call has these flaws doesn't make him evil or bad. I think he's a tragic figure and I loved the way Tommy Lee Jones played him, as someone who simply could not speak the feelings he had aloud. They make him complex and even sympathetic. But that doesn't mean Clara doesn't have the right to call him out on them.
It "sent her over the edge"...there should not have been an edge in the first place since she had no real reason to hate Call before that. If a person she liked did the same thing, there would have been no "edge".
While I absolutely feel terrible for Call when Clara rages at him, I do understand her motivation.
Clara had lost her own little boys. And when that happened, she was so devastated she sat in the ice house (freezer) with their little bodies and nearly died, just to be with them. She wrote to Gus repeatedly with no answer. She was utterly alone with a foolish husband, two tiny little girls, and (luckily) a sympathetic and gifted farmhand who became a good friend (Cholo).
She had already given up marriage with her true love (Gus) knowing he would never leave Call. She survived in a harsh place where death was everywhere. And she would have killed to have a son as good, sweet and worthy as Newt. But Call threw him away, treated him like trash, and
year after year never even gave him the knowledge of his parenthood or his own name. Right under his own roof.
I understand that Call's reasons for this were all wrapped up in his own confusion and failings, but Clara doesn't, and that's believable to me. It's one of the reasons the book and miniseries are so great. Call, and even Gus, would still never quite understand what Clara had suffered or why she was so angry. Just like Call never understood Maggie, Newt's mother.
This is one of the reasons I've never liked that character. She's so smugly self-righteous and openly anti-male. It reveals to me why Gus did not choose her. She seems very inflexible and would have tried to change Gus into something he wasn't...and made him unhappy.
I agree that Clara comes off as smug and self-righteous with Call. She herself understands that she is being hateful and that her emotions are wasted there, she just can't help herself.
However, I don't agree that Clara is actually anti-male. She actually likes and appreciates men -- look at her relationships with Cholo, Gus, Jake, etc. And she did her best to love and support her husband even after realizing he was a fool. She is also gentle and kind with July Johnson, whom she takes him into her family and supports, along with his newborn son.
Also, you're incorrect on Gus not choosing Clara:
Gus chose Clara. He
begged her to stay with him. I think ultimately you didn't get the real story here: Gus and Jake both pursued Clara. Gus asked her to marry him. Clara turned Gus down repeatedly, because she saw that (1) Gus was a wanderer who would not be happy staying with her, (2) she knew marrying Gus would also in a sense mean tying herself to Call forever, and she knew that would not end well and she would most likely lose; and (3) she didn't want to make him unhappy. So she chose a boring ordinary man who would give her children and stability, and still loved Gus from afar (and in a very generous character note in book and miniseries), still wished to be friends with him, to hear from him, and to have his friendship for her children.
How is this selfish, mean, or unforgiving? Clara loved Gus, but also was generous enough to love and accept Lorie too, right away (Gus's new love), and without judgment of any kind. She also accepted Newt instantly, gave him a beautiful horse, and hoped he would marry one of her girls.
Call is seriously probably the
ONE person Clara hates, and while I myself love him in spite of his flaws, I do understand her feelings. No matter how inadvertently, Call kept Gus from finding happiness (and ironically could never even admit happiness to himself too).
When it comes down to it, your only problem with Clara is that she hates Call. It doesn't seem to matter to you that, as a character, Clara has every reason to hate Call. She hates him for the past (Gus's loss of a wife, family, stability) and hates him for the present (his cruelty in withholding from his own beautiful son his acknowledgement or name), and the future (Call taking Gus away to be buried elsewhere). I understand why Call is fulfilling his promise to Gus, but I also understand Clara's sadness -- once again, Call is taking Gus away from her.
For me, characters like Call and Clara help make the book incredibly rich and complex, and the miniseries tried really hard to show that in a lovely way -- I love Call and understand his failings. But I love Clara too, and she was the one who took people in, rather than denying a good boy his name and birthright.
We'll probably have to agree to disagree at this point. Thanks for the discussion.
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I keep thinking I'm a grownup, but I'm not.
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