I just wanted to bang her head against a wall!! She was unbelievably selfish (I know she had her reasons) But just through one tiny kiss with Kitty and WHAM she wants to kill her self! Was it just me? Id like to hear others opinions.
shareThe Julianne Moore character is not likable at all. She's weeping and crying and running off. But I think that's the point about her. From outside she looks what was then considered typically feminine in all her behaviour. But the thing is that she is not a typical helpless female at all. She is somebody who has his own head - as strange as it might be. Thus, the last thing this person would want is actually the kind of life that she lives with her husband and her kids.
We don't learn much about her - except that she has never had much of an idea how to 'fit in'. This is why I think she loves her friend 'Kitty' so much. I don't think she is in love with her (you find that out when you read the book and when you look at the structure of the film). She admires her and she wants to be like her. She just has no idea how to do it. The reason that she kisses Kitty, I think, is to show the audience that she's pretty far away from what a 'typical woman' is. Thus, Kitty is her opposite as well as the respresentation of the society that she won't fit into and supresses her. She doesn't know how to fit in, how to make it right (thinf about the cake and Kitty's reaction). At the same time she suffocates under the expectations.
I think that the drowning is a reference not only to Virginia Woolf's death, but also to Ophelia in Hamlet, who kills herself because of the suppression she suffers from the 'patriarch society'. And in the end, Julianne Moore admits so in her conversation with Meryl Streep: 'It's what you can bear.'
I agree that Laura's actions were extremely selfish, but I a still very empathetic towards her character. She is aware that leaving her family would placed the a huge stigma on her for the rest of her life, and it is a price that she accepts. I think that it is quite clear even from the movie that Laura does indeed live out her later years being labelled a "monster" for abandoning her family.
I think you are placing too much importance on her kiss with Kitty. Laura didn't necessarily feel unhappy in her marriage because she was a lesbian, the kiss was more to show that Laura never got to discover who she was for herself before being thrust into this role of a wife and mother by society. She already feels awkward and disconnected before Kitty's visit, as evidenced by her earlier scenes with Richie and Dan.
The "I had an idea of our happiness" scene sums it up pretty well. Dan clearly loves Laura very much and seems to be a good-hearted man from what we see, but his speech at dinner only confirms for Laura his love would always be associated with the repression that she feels. Though his dream is a pure and loving one, it is indeed his "idea of happiness". Laura is just a character in his (albeit deserved) ideal world, nothing in her life as a housewife clicked with who she really was.
I wondered what people on this thread thought of Kitty's reaction to Laura's kiss. She seemed to really like it before switching to not talking about it and getting out of there.
"Two more swords and I'll be Queen of the Monkey People." Roseanne
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I just saw the movie for the first time and wish that the stories of Moore and Kidman would have been left on the cutting room floor. I just couldn't figure out a legitimate reason for their despair. It was as though they were pathologically unable to count their blessings.
What annoyed me the most was when Laura came to Clarissa's home and started whining about her issues after less than two minutes into the door. Not a movie I'd recommend.
Virginia Woolf had a 'legitimate reason', she was abused as a child. So was Vanessa Bell, her sister - the one she kissed (because she envied her for her sanity and/or for attention).
A key theme of the novel is apparently hostility towards mental health. Isn't that weird? It's like the story behind these decisions to commit suicide, and there will always be a story - whether or not you think its relevant. Cunningham won the Pulitzer prize for talking about suicide. People hate suicide, which is nice in a way.
Not that I've read it, but I think analysis says Cunningham was addressing how a mentally-ill person will be a story of numerous aspects and contradictions of psychology and experience - but that all three of them and Richard were extremely sensitive and perceptive to the nuances of life. As a result they contemplated suicide for it's simplicity as a solution.
Brown knew what she was doing was wrong, and she said she forgave herself because she couldn't regret something she had no choice over. It's a glum story but I believe that depression can be really debilitating. J.Moore was SO good! It's a good movie.
Absolutely terrific response.
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