Those "roads not taken" are compelling though aren't they?Z
You'd better believe it. But I look at it this way: In a marriage (or other form of lifetime commitment), the forsaking of others is the price you're paying for the depth of a lifelong relationship with This One Person. And that one person knows it. If she does the same for you, then it's the price she's paid, and pays every day, for making you her only. That's how much she thinks you're worth, and how much you think she's worth. In other words, the high value you put on that other person, and that she (or he) puts on you, is in direct proportion to how aware you are, and he or she is, of the roads not taken (which, I guess, can be any form of alternative lives not lived, which can involve other people, other spouses, other lovers, whatever). It's like a daily sacrifice:
The rest of the world isn't worth as much to me as you and this one single life together. Pretty powerful, but I don't think people tend to think of it that way. They think, "I'm more attracted to you now than anybody else, so hey, I guess we should get married," and then in five years, or seven, or ten, when the "feeling" changes, the basis for the terms changes, and it's over.
This is why I really think any discussion of marital fidelity really is a discussion of the acknowledgement of human limitedness and mortality. You're limiting your life to the life you have with this one person, and there are no do-overs. That can be a beautiful, deep, wonderful thing, but I do think people need exactly that sobering thought when they decide to make that lifetime commitment. Marriage shouldn't be just a "natural next step" for people who are dating and really like each other. It shouldn't be a matter of degree -- as in, "I love you so much now, there's just nothing to do other than to get married." If by "love" that person means a strong feeling of affection, that feeling can vary over time. It can't be the central basis of a marriage, but if it isn't, then what
is the basis? Margot doesn't have an answer for that. Neither do a lot of people. Maybe most people.
As for your second graf, I'm trying to follow the argument, but I think I'm missing something important. When you say "I don't think it's a burningly relevant scene for Margot," and "I think it's one of the few scenes actually - maybe the only scene - that feels in some ways a statement in itself, outwith the film and its characters' predicaments," I'm thinking that the film itself and its entire thematic thrust is beyond these specific characters, as is the case with just about all really good films, far as I'm concerned. (I really am less and less likely to pay any attention to films that are about nothing but their own running time, especially the ones that do so in a hypocritical postmodernist oh-so-coolism mode, because
that's the statement those films are making beyond their own running time, which they pretend not to be making at all.) And I absolutely think there are both dialogue and visuals in the scene that go straight to what's going on with Margot, which is a question or set of questions just about every married person is conscious of at some point. In fact, the material in this scene is
so relevant and
so obvious that I thought it might've come off a little clunky. So I must be missing what you're saying, or maybe it's just a difference of opinion.
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