MovieChat Forums > Mank (2020) Discussion > Question (Possible Spoiler)

Question (Possible Spoiler)


Does anyone know what the significance was when Louis B Mayer throws his handkerchief out the window of his car when driving away from Thalberg's funeral?

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Probably he'd been crying. It was a pretty tragic story.

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That’s what I thought, but the movie portrayed Mayer as greedy bastard with no redeeming qualities throughout the rest of the movie, so it seemed a little odd.

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A lot of this movie assumes you know about the real people.

If you read The Lion of Hollywood, Mayer comes out as a curious character, often tough, but with a sentimental streak, especially when it came to mothers and motherhood. Thalberg, a genius who practically ran the studio artistically, was sort of a son to him and died so tragically at such a young age (37). After his passing. Mayer had to hire not one but four producers to cover the work he had been doing. It was also true that maybe Mayer saw the death as a harbinger, the beginning of the end, as Mayer himself would be terminated just a few years later.

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Thank you for the reply. I knew that Thalberg died young and was had a reputation as respectful amazing producer. However the movie is full of lies making it hard to comprehend the filmmaker’s intentions at times. The main story line is a widely debunked rumor that Mankiewicz solely wrote Citizen Kane and Orson Welles tried to take all the credit while contributing nothing to the screenplay.

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I'm not sure that's the main storyline though. That is a storyline, sure. Really it's a story about a Seeker of the Truth, which is the concept in many of Fincher's works.

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