The seizure

He did touch her a bit just before she went into a seizure so I think the consensus is that the seizure was induced by pleasure. I don't really know what to take from that scene, though, other than Heidecker's character is a sociopath

I'm not really sure what brought on the seizure as my knowledge of epilepsy is limited, but I think what was important in that scene is that Swanson was prepared to let this girl die before his very eyes. Perhaps its because he's using his own immature, juvenile means of preparing for his father's death and if watching this young girl die in front of him is an opportunity to callus himself further, he would take it.... Or maybe it's as simple as he's a psychotic sociopath. I just really saw an interesting parallel between this scene, the one where's he's picking at his sleeping "date's" face while she sleeps, and the scene where he's wandering through the hospital looking/interacting with dying people. I saw the seizure and all of the previously mentioned scenes as Swanson using his own tools to deal with something incredibly real, and he does so the way he does everything else in this movie: strangely and disturbingly.

Seizures happen and can be brought on by stimulation, physical or emotional. He did what he should have. She was in a safe place and did what he should have done. let her seizure. You are not supposed to do anything to inhibit seizures,but make sure they are safe from harming themselves.

His watching is normal, but he did seem to not look worried. I've seen plenty of seizures in my life and they always make me worried, even though they are not going to die.




Dictated, but not read.

I came to this board with the express hope that someone would have the same question! It seemed random and they probably would have done well to mention her having some kind of condition earlier in the movie, but that might undermine the sort of existentialist anti-narrative verisimilitude bla bla bla sense the flick was going for. It could have also had to do with the fact that she was smoking pot and drinking and it was hot in the boat, plus the sexual stuff, she probably got overstimulated and had a seizure. Definitely the most powerful scene in the movie though, and I think that writing it off as Swanson trying to find ways to cope with his father's death might be giving the Swanson character a little too much credit. In fact, I think being around intensely serious and uncomfortable situations are bread and butter to Swanson because he's so detached from the world by his sense of irony, and watching a woman almost die right in front of his eyes would just be another experience for him where he might actually feel something, so he just let it happen. Alas, he clearly felt nothing. That character is way far gone.

He's just a curious dude, he knew about her condition beforehand and like the sleeping woman who's eyelids he played with, he also found this womans body interesting. But yeah it caught me off guard.

"the day I tried to live, I learned that I was alive"

Here's what I got from the seizure scene:

Tim Heidecker finally has this girl to connect with. They have the same humor. They are both crude. They're perfect together and Swanson knows that. Anyways. When he finds this girl that he can connect with, he touches her and they fool around. BUT. She breaks out into a seizure. Swanson is very attached to this woman and she breaks out into a seizure and he just sits there and gives up. It suck, ya know? He FINALLY found a woman he can connect with. He's happy to have her. But she seizes.. and he basically gives up. That's why he just sits there. Thats what I got from it. It can be many different things. I really enjoyed this movie. But you can't look at it on its face. You have to dig deeper and really look into it.

There are four scenes throughout the film that mirror each other, including the seizure scene. In each, he's in an intimate space with another, and he seems to be testing boundaries physically, as if he's an alien and trying to understand how humans work.

The scenes are:
1> Tim at his father's bedside
2> Tim pulling on girl's eyelid
3> Tim combing man's hair in hospital
4> Tim watching the seizure

In 3 of the 4, he acts basically the way he acts towards people in general - detached, observing, provocative, somewhat anti-social. He seems to have a connection with the waitress, but ultimately they're not authentic or sincere with one another, ever. So, when he watches her seizure, his reaction is in keeping with their relationship.

In the scene with the hair combing, though, he seems extremely embarassed when the nurse comes in and catches him having an actual warm human emotion. He's caringly brushing this man's hair, a man who could be his father, and I think it's the only time we get to see him be a "real" person. I would link this scene to the one on the boat with his sister-in-law, and the final scene in the water playing, that results in a reason for hope for the character.

She was faking it to cockblock and spite him.