The movie The Hours that we have almost finished watching had managed to confuse me to no end. I understand the plot and what's happening to the characters, but I don't understand why some of them depressed in the first place. For instance, Richie's mother Laura. She almost kills herself before reconsidering, thankfully for her son. But, similarly to the way Mrs. Dalloway is almost made to commit suicide by Woolf, she has nothing to traumatize her. She doesn't even dwell on her past in the same way that Mrs. Dalloway does. I suppose that she could be feeling depressed because she is unable to satisfy or let herself experience her feelings for other women, especially her friend Kitty. But, she has family that loves her and I think she is just feeling confused.
Clarissa Vaughan is also a complicated character. She is experiencing a slow mental breakdown similar to that of both Septimus and Rezia, because her past is catching up to her mentally like Septimus, but she is also in the position of Rezia because she has to watch someone that she loves suffer and eventually take their own life.
I think that if both of these characters were able to sort out their thought and emotions regarding their respective pasts and presents, they would be able to lead much happier lives and hopefully not continually influencing the lives of those they love in a negative way (especially Laura).
1 comment:
It's interesting--this same idea is addressed in the movie, when Louis complains about the character (based on his mother?) in Richard's novel kills herself "for no reason, out of the blue." Depression doesn't always have some immediate cause in the outside world. And she seems generally so ill-equipped to do the "simple" things that are expected of her as a housewife to a perfectly decent, likable, boring and unattractive guy in the 1950s LA suburbs--wouldn't it be depressing to have to engage with such a world, day after day, even though it remains thoroughly baffling and intimidating to you? This doesn't touch the question of her actions themselves (leaving for Canada, etc.); we all have a right to judge those as we will (she "doesn't expect to be forgiven"). But the depression itself is pretty comprehensible to me.
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