MovieChat Forums > Angela's Ashes (2000) Discussion > Frank finds cache of money, why doesn’t ...

Frank finds cache of money, why doesn’t he take the whole thing?


an interesting movie although quite depressing – still, the Irish seem to have an innate charm, no matter what! – In the film: a bit irreverent about the RC Church and its tenets, maybe; nice scenes with the pretty Theresa; the drunkenness the father falls into, sad (things like this: one reason I remain in AA!) – but to get to my question,
I don’t get it, Frank finds woman (moneylender) dead, finds chest and takes money, seemingly leaves ½ behind – a bit odd, I thought, if he’s taking the money at all (getting away from moral question -- and he in a state of poverty after all) why throw any of it back – maybe wasn’t clear, the papers could have been things like deeds or something, useless to him, or maybe some local ritual, a sign of respect – anyway, when he finds cache of money – and maybe she was a spinster, had no dependents – while he was at it, why not take the whole amount? – just wondering

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[deleted]

I wondered that myself. It's been ages since I read the book, and I can't remember whether it was explained there or not. I thought that maybe he left some behind so that it wouldn't be super obvious that he had robbed her. If people had seen him going into her house, and no money was found in her cash box, it would be easy to tie him to it. Also, he destroyed her ledger, so maybe there was no record of how much she had in the first place? I don't know.

But yeah, my theory is that he left some behind to deflect suspicion.

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He only took enough to buy his ticket to America. Tossing away her ledger was more of help to his friends and neighbor's than the cash would have been. Plus taking all the money would have raised more suspicions of his theft. With the ledger gone, there was no way to reconcile the accounts but having no cash on hand would have been very suspicious.

Sure he could have done more, but at his heart he's a good Catholic boy. :-)

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