Does anyone think... SPOILERS - Asylum (2005) Discussion

[–] ldn-1 19 years ago

I didn't read this much into it, but I can see where you're coming from. I thought that she was partly caught up in her own thoughts and also assuming that her son was playing. Remember how, in an earlier scene, he asked her to time him while he stayed underwater in the bath? I think the idea was that she thought he was playing, and was too caught up with herself to realise otherwise until it was too late.

reply

[–] cindymook 19 years ago

Think u might have something there.. I thought about it... But i also thougt of Dr. Cleaver being a part of the hole outcome of things... That he gets her husband fired.. that he pushes her into the arms of Edgar.... And then getting her to married him...I find it all rather strange... Dont find it logic and true...To much strange things goin on to find it true... Maybe i should read the book

reply

[–] ayers-rock 19 years ago

I did have the same suspicions as you, cindymook, and it fits perfectly that Dr. Cleaver wants to marry Stella. It is a way of getting "closer" to Edgar. He uses it to make him speak again, and to controll him. I am not sure what he feels for Stella (I really should read the book...), but I rather think he is sad about her suicide because now he lost controll over Edgar.

...but perhaps I am totally wrong... :)

reply

[–] sebastiansmurf 19 years ago

great observation! hadn't thought of it before, but it certainly is interesting. thanks for pointing it out!

www.povertyfighters.com
www.thehungersite.com
www.stopthehunger.com

reply

[–] 19 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Amaranta20 19 years ago

"She says earlier on that she can't be with him because of her son and so if he wasn't there then nothing could stop her. "

I think that's a great observation.

I figured she was in some ultra, disassociative depression but even so I can't get inside her head there. Because I feel like some part of her brain had to be aware that he was drowning, even if most of her was shut down, so I couldn't understand why that one part didn't freak out and make her help him. I really like your observation. That's something I can accept, to explain it to me. Granted, I still think it's not an evil-villain conscious choice to sacrifice her son, but I bet that's in there. Also perhaps something about punishing her husband for having Edgar arrested.

Ian McKellan I also can't figure out. I can't tell if he's in love with Edgar and therefore intentionally drives her to commit suicide, or if he actually does love her, or if it's all just some big psychological experiment to him. Any thoughts?

reply

[–] pshelton-1 19 years ago

I thought Ian McKellan's acting was superb in this film. I believe he was possessive of Edgar. He told Stella near the beginning of the film that "he's mine." I also don't think Stella ever got over Edgar, despite what she told Dr. Cleave. I think that's obvious at the asylum ball near the end.

Dr. Cleave wanted to control her either in the asylum or by marriage, thereby controlling her access to Edgar. He wanted them to become indifferent about each other. All his manipulations of them didn't bring that about. When he observed at the dance that Stella was anxious to see Edgar, he took Edgar back to his cell.

My thoughts on her suicide: she knew she and Edgar could never be together because of the doctor's control over them, or maybe she didn't want to go into another loveless, passionless marriage. The experience of a passionate relationship seemed to have become extremely important to her.

The irony was that Dr. Cleave's "field, specialty" was sexual relationships that had catastrophic consequences. His so-called guidance and control of these two emotionally disturbed people caused the worst catastrophic outcome of all. He was as sick as they were.

reply

[–] joker_begins 19 years ago

I think thats he was he was trying to contorl both Stella and Edger and all the things you just said but I do think that a least a part of dr Cleave did love Stella the look on his face when he saw Stella dying and when she said for him to leave her alone I was surprised by how sad he look

CHANGE OF PLAN LEG IT!!!!- lister red dwarf

reply

[–] pzazz_hij 19 years ago

I think, personally, that the significance of Edgars sculpture of Stella is the key to this. When Dr. Cleave finds the small sculpture and sees within the fine art work of it that Edgar isn't just fooling around with Stella or using her in anyway, he realises that Edgar really is in love with her.

This leads me to think that his intentions are to make his own sculpure of her but using her confused mental state as his clay, so to speak.

So if we were to consider Amaranta20's proposal of the possibility that Dr. Cleave was in love with Edgar ("I can't tell if he's in love with Edgar and therefore intentionally drives her to commit suicide") then it can be concluded that he thought he could have Edgar and do with him as he pleased for as long as he wanted as long as he had control of the force that had come to be driving Edgar, aka, his love for Stella.

reply

[–] baronvonhoopla 19 years ago

In the book she is just plain crazy and depressed when it happens, and although she notices it happening it doesn't register as something bad.

reply

[–] baronvonhoopla 19 years ago

In the book she is just plain crazy and depressed when it happens, and although she notices it happening it doesn't register as something bad.

reply

[–] hownos 18 years ago

Wasn't Dr Cleave Queer ????

reply

[–] go-for-the-gusto 19 years ago

As though you haven't already received enough feedback on this question, I've decided to skip checking to see if anyone got it right, and just tell you the straight official explanation of Stella's inaction while watching her son die: She believed she saw Edgar drowning. Sitting on a rock, smoking her cigarette she barely registered what was happening to Charlie and was losing touch with things in general. In the novel, the shabby house they move into in Cledwyn is actually a duplex and she begins allowing the landlord (who lived in the other side with his wife) to have sex with her, she feeling thoroughly apathetic in the first place. This apathy infetcted her mind and she simply didn't realize that the drowning was actually happening and, strangely, she saw Edgar going under.

Or something like that.

"It's only when we feel pain, or the prospect of it, that we start to make distinctions between right and wrong."

reply

[–] AuntieKaren 19 years ago

Oh wow, I had suppressed the part in the book about her sleeping with the unclean neighbor after they fled north. She was so dissociated from her own body at that point she didn't care much what happened to it.

I read the book a few years ago and remembered her terrible apathy, but the thing

SPOILER YES

that sticks with me like yesterday is the very end when Dr. Cleave is admiring the little sculptured head, glad he has the little likeness of Stella, and then

"And, of course, I still have him."

Made the marrow of my bones cold.

*****MORE SPOILERS*****

Edit 11 April: Just finished reading the book again (first read it ten years ago) and actually I think the movie is better in some ways -- regarding Edgar not going to the dance, the book has only Cleave stating "He was in no shape to attend a dance" which sounds ominous, but all it really means is, Edgar was refusing to talk to Cleave. And Cleave was determined to break him, keeping him on the top floor of the Refractory Wing.

In the book Stella dies quietly with sleeping pills she's saved up. Cleave had assumed she wore the black silk dress to flaunt her high spirits at the administrators, even though she's become a patient. Too late, Cleave realizes she wore the dress again for Edgar. All the while Cleave was nattering on about honeymooning in Italy, Stella was clinging to her wan hope that Edgar was actually in Broadmoor (Cleave had told her Edgar was not there) and that Edgar would come to the dance, where she would be waiting to dance with him, wearing her wedding dress.

reply

[–] CrzyFudg 19 years ago

subconciously she wanted her son to die. He was the only thing holding her back from running off with Edgar. Technically no son, no barrier to Edgar. A son still alive would have made it impossible to run away from the marriage and not feel too much guilt. In the end, she was probably mentally, spiritually and physically exhausted. Her mind & body have been consumed by passion for Edgar...it played out just the way it was suppose to. I do believe if she had not went and met with Edgar at the abandoned house once more she would have probably not have been so preoccupied.

Just a humble opinion....

as usual, Chele Belle

reply

[–] 19 years ago

[deleted]

[–] AntSpeaks 19 years ago

Ummm...I don't think that she registered that her son was drowning. Throughout the entire movie, she obviously loved her son, and even when she was with Edgar, she continually thought about her son, and missed him all the time. It looked as if she had been lost in her own thoughts and just didn't "see" what was going on... Sometimes a person's internal thoughts are so overwhelming to them that they see what's in their heads, and not what's right in front of them.

In my opinion, Stella would have done better if:

a) she had confronted her husband any time he said something nasty to her, and tell him to shut his trap and start treating her with respect.

or

b) left that jerk officially and took her son with her. I know it was the 50's and divorce was maybe not that well looked-upon, but it did happen from time to time. She shouldn't have been treated like that...from him OR Edgar.

However...I'm also led to believe that she was her husband's patient, perhaps, before they had wed, as there is a conversation that they have in which she says, "Who is your pet patient." And he says, "You." I'm not sure if he is just being nasty and telling her that since she's a woman, she is therefore unstable and emotion (such a trying thing! *sarcasm*)...or if she had a previous history with mental instability...

Anyone who read the book who might have any ideas on this?

reply

[–] borntotalk93 19 years ago

in the book her husband doe not hit,i think they added that part to make you hate her husband like he was the villian.he was in a way,it was like he only stayed with her at the end so he could say well at least i stayed,like that made him a better person.also,the show nick to be sweet and kind when in the book it tells you he was very turned on by stella and she said she thought he might rape her because he acted like hungry dog ready to strike so she finally gave in to him.they should have put in the movie about how dazed she was that she did not leave edgar until she thought that he thought she was poisoning there food that's why after he beat her in the book he cut up an orange he made her eat a piece first then he ate some.in the movie i did love the part when she jumps off the roof and says to cleave "leave me alone".finally some one told him off in a way.i didn't like peter but's strange since the book is told in by his character.he made you want to tell him to but out.
i like both the movie and the book and i wish there was more books turned into movies like this one.

reply

[–] kimberley35 19 years ago

Yeah, I totally agree with you about her telling the doctor to "leave me alone". I mean, considering that was her last words after she just jumped off a roof, crashed through glass and landed on a hard floor, that's pretty powerful. To me, it shows she was tired of being messed with. She was a grieving mother, and this doctor was playing head games with her and the man she wanted to be with. Obviously she was sane enough to see what he was doing.

reply

[–] ex-inferis-asha 18 years ago

After Edgar was recaptured part of Stella knew that they were never going to be together again anyway. He was a convicted murderer. I think she was so lost in her own 'self pity' and depressive delusion that she simply did not see or hear her son.............she didnt even register when the teacher ran past for a while. She wouldnt have let him drown if she had been in her 'right mind'.

reply

[–] kentucky_fried_fetus-1 18 years ago

My English is poor but I will try to explain my point of view.
I think love is something so hard that happy ever after in
most of all movies frequently end at the wedding. All romantics
thoughts seems as utopias. Some people turn the page on with
rational decisions others doesn't have the straight. After they
did live together she understand that wasn't to meant, she was so
weak mentally that she is incapable to see what was going on with
her son, she is empty, alone and delusionary. A sick person
literally. This doctor is envy of her husband so he want everything
that belongs him. He is a very manipulative person and he is consequently
incapable of love. So Asylum as the name indicate is about crazy people and
this doctor is the craziest. Please correct me if I am wrong.

reply

[–] suhashdas 18 years ago

I think she would have died either way, suicide or at the hands of Edgar because he was obviously sick and his sickness would have found a reason(jealousy) to kill her. Her lust overshadowed her love for her son who was her only lifeline. So her death was inevitable.

reply

[–] ex-inferis-asha 18 years ago

Ive just read the book which says she was actually in a state of clinical depression when her son drowned. She couldnt have saved him. I really recommend the book as it explains a lot. Stellas character had sunk into such a depression; she never saw edgar again after the last violent episode when she though he was going to kill her with the knife and she was having sex after she left him with Nick (once) and the farmer (reguarly) in Wales. I love the film but it IS different to the book. It explains her feelings toward her son and her growing disinterest in him.

reply

[–] lizard666666 18 years ago

I was interested in the question, "Wasn't Dr Cleave Queer ???? " by hownos.
Didn't Edgar say something like, "why would she be attracted to an old queen like you?" I think Cleave was jealous of Stella, she turned Edgar on. Someone mentioned he wanted to control both of them, I agree, but I think he had the hots for Edgar. He was too involved as evidenced by his yelling at Edgar to speak. It was almost a cliche on Edgar's part, "I'm not talking to you."

reply

[–] sle212 17 years ago

Yes, I agree. Dr. Cleaves was infatuated with Edgar, whether it was love or desire to control him. He wanted to marry Stella as another way of controlling Edgar. When Stella leapt from the building, it wasn't pain over her death that we saw, but pain from the realization that he lost his ability to use Stella to control Edgar. Maybe this is too perverse, but there was a scene when Edgar wanted to see Stella and Cleaves said something about him being able to if he was "cooperating" with his therapy. I imagined Cleaves was hoping to -- eventually -- get a trade off: Edgar gives him what he wants, and he would allow Edgar to see Stella. And when Stella died, there was nothing left that could have driven Edgar into Cleaves' arms.

And I think Stella knew that Cleaves finally saw through her "disinterest" in Edgar at the dance. Stella was hoping to use Cleaves to get closer to Edgar. WHen CLeaves figured out she was still pining for Edgar, she realized her manipulation was never going to work. Her last words to Cleaves was her admission that she still loved Edgar and didn't want anyone to change that.

reply

[–] J. Spurlin 18 years ago

I think she subconsciously wanted the boy to die. I immediately assumed this, partly because of a similar scene in Leave Her to Heaven, where there's no ambiguity.

... J. Spurlin

reply