MovieChat Forums > The Rain People (1969) Discussion > symbolism and irony

symbolism and irony

posted 12 years ago by totsyboy
2 replies | jump to latest

I saw this movie over 30 years ago, and although I haven't seen it since, I remember a fair amount about it because of the effect it had on me at the time. I'm surprised that there has been no discussion of the obvious irony in the film. Here you have Natalie, running away from her life and the enormous responsibility of having/raising a child looming, and she ends up getting involved with a "child" in Caan's character. The responsibility of looking after someone that she is trying to escape is forced upon her. Did she finally come to grips with this responsibility, or did she fail? I don't remember enough about the ending to recall...

[–] glasshull 10 years ago

She said he was going to live, after being shot, and he was going to come live with her and Vinnie. I thought of that too. It made me think that she was going to go home and have her baby. That she realized there was room in her life to accommodate another person in it.

[–] Wuchak (8837) 4 months ago

It's a sound interpretation. Coppola originally intended for there to be an additional scene in which Vinny (Natalie's husband) picks her up the following morning.