MovieChat Forums > The Life Before Her Eyes (2008) Discussion > My Analysis - MAJOR Spoilers

My Analysis - MAJOR Spoilers

posted 14 years ago by cheers-2
5 replies | jump to latest

A few years ago I saw this movie and it intrigued me very much. I was very taken with it and it is one of my favorite movies for many reasons. I wrote a review – which you can read here: http://heatherrayne.wordpress.com/2008/05/14/the-life-before-her-eyes-a-review/

And I also wrote about what I thought the meaning of the movie was to me. But I lost that part – grrr. Recently I suggested it to a friend and I wanted to discuss some of this with her, but I had a hard time recalling the details. So, I watched it again today and took notes. Below are just some random things I noticed while watching the second time and also some thoughts on how I interpreted the movie. Know that you should NOT read this is you have not seen the movie. It will ruin it and it is a great movie which I would hate to ruin for anyone.

At least three times in the movie (in car with daughter, in car with Maureen and whistled by mailman) was the song “She’s Not There”

Choose Life bumper sticker on Maureen’s car

Art subjects in (grown) Diane’s art classes – Difference between real and imagined & Who are we, where are we going (Gauguin – symbolist artist – known for quasi religious symbolism – clashing often with Catholic church)

While swimming alone, ultrasound noises while touching her belly

She wears the same bangle bracelets as young and grown Diane

Butterflies are often pictured – drawings, tattoos, actual – butterflies signify going from one life to the next – metamorphosis

Twice it is repeated, the scene when Maureen says something about the rain crushing the flowers and some stay crushed and some pop back up.

Water is a big element in this movie. Water usually symbolizes life, death and rebirth. Through pool scenes to rainstorms and at the end – the seemingly raining of water in the bathroom water seems a constant theme. Diane asks Maureen is people evaporate like mist and just disperse into the universe “I wonder who were breathing in now” she says tongue in cheek. This ‘mist’ is common as is the consistent displays of insects, pollen and flowers in the movie. Very detailed, colorful closeups. Many whom have had NDEs (near death experiences) have reported that once they realized they were dead, they suddenly understood that all energy is equal…meaning people, cats, insects…we are all one and none is more important than the other.

As grown Diane runs through the woods towards the end searching for her daughter Emma, young Diane walks through the mock cemetery for the ‘unborn’ searching for the name Emma (a name she picked out earlier in the movie when talking about baby names). Many people think that because of these metaphors, the movie was trying to deliver an anti-abortion theme. I do not believe this is the case and actually quite opposite – well not opposite, but vastly different. I believe the choosing the art and discussions of Gauguin were no coincidence.

I think it s just an honest take on a girl’s journey through guilt and feelings of unworthiness. She is guilty about her abortion. I highly doubt anyone who has had the procedure does so without guilt. She is ashamed of her (sexual) behavior and this is why the word “slut’ is so upsetting to her. In the moments at the end when her imagined future life is going ‘before her eyes’, she is seeing it through the eyes of one who feels guilt and shame. I think this is why she projected that her future husband would cheat. This is why as grown Diane she states “I don’t deserve this”.

In one of the final scenes, we see Diane and Maureen attending a lecture given by grown Diane’s professor husband – the same man Diane is talking about as they walk into the bathroom (she says she keeps calling and hanging up). This is what he says which has her fixated during his speech:

“Begin to be now what you will be hereafter….Our deepest guide in our beginning to BE is imagination. Our ability to project and mold our future selves from the myriad of possibilities before us.”

The entire experience of grown Diane is young Diane’s projection of what her life would have been. She projected the guilt – both survivors and about the abortion, her unworthiness as explained above, her hiding daughter…all what she in that flash projected what her life would have been like if Maureen had been the victim.

What do you think?

http://heatherrayne.wordpress.com

[–] whitespirit26 14 years ago

Weird that she supposedly died for her best friend here. I heard that in the book, Maureen died anyway.

[–] aimless-46 14 years ago

In the book exactly what happens to Maureen is never specified, Kasischke is vague enough that it could be interpreted that both girls are killed, although that is not the way I interpreted it. In fact the character names "Diana" and "Maureen" are only used in the segments discussing what happened in Diana's imagined future (and it is discussed in the past tense).

In the book (as in the film) Michael Patrick tells the girls that he intends to kill only one of them and then asks them who he should kill. In the last paragraph he shoots Diana in her temporal lobe (the part of the brain where her future has been imagined). By this point Diana's present and her imagined future have merged and become indistinguishable to her (Diana's name is finally being used in both); in the imagined future Michael Patrick has assumed the guise of a wolf who is threatening Emma. Diana sacrifices herself to save Emma from the wolf at the same moment she sacrifices herself to save Maureen from Michael. It is clear that Emma is saved which is why I assume the same outcome for Maureen.

[–] whitespirit26 14 years ago

Oh, so she did die for her daughter by the wolf. Huh. Well, glad the weird imaginary future is explained through the frontal lobe, but I still find it a lesser ending.

[–] merlinsbeard 14 years ago

I agree, whitespirit26, although I would add that I find any insistance on narrowing a book or a movie down to a "correct" interpretation is a lesser ending, no matter what the author and/or director intended.

I also don't believe that "what we are led to assume" has to be viewed as the "right" ending.

The better a book or film is, the more it will exceed its originator's intentions. So, even when we are led somewhere by the originator, the work itself may well lead us beyond that. That's when I know I'm in the presence of a really good one!

Also, (and maybe this was mentioned on the other thread? can't remember) I think we don't have to assume that one or the other of the girls died, either. They both might have died. They both might have been wounded severely but survived, ultimately.

And even beyond that-- this movie spurred me to think about alternate realities, too. We can't say that "we know" that one or the other of them "has" to die, simply because none of us *really* knows how it all works-- all of it-- throughout time and the universe and whatever layers of possibilities there may be.

You may be living three different lives right now-- you know? How could you say for sure, one way or the other? And, therefore, how can somebody else say that you're living only one life, or that this movie means only one thing?

All I can describe-- or try to describe-- is my experience at this moment, but even that is so limited a viewpoint, since my mind comprehends only a fraction of the stimuli coming in and probably comprehends only a miniscule fraction-of-a-fraction of what my spirit/soul/whatever you want to call it is experiencing.

Maybe all we EVER do on this plane is TRY ON different POSSIBILITIES, as we've speculated that maybe Uma Thurman's character may have done in this film, and then let those lives "pass before our eyes," and then decide whether we want to hit "save" or not? Maybe that's what THIS life is, right now, even-- just a trying on of an idea. How would I know any different at this moment, especially if I were really seeking to give it a good try? In fact, it seems to me that the more one would be trying to give it a really good shot-- this trying on of a possibility-- the less one would be able to KNOW about it while IN it. Know what I mean?

My bottom line is this: if one really frees one's mind from the typical expectations of what a story is "supposed to do" (i.e., give us a definitive ending that leaves us with "answers" and so forth), then a story can bring up all sorts of fascinating speculations about the characters in the story, about one's self, about the human experience at large.

I'm not saying we shouldn't venture discussions and suggestions about what comes to mind-- not at all. I am just wanting to allow a freer play of ideas than some posters seem to want to allow. Superior knowledge of a filmmaker or "the book" or whatever one might bring up can solve all questions once and for all isn't always the "definitive answer"-- particularly the better a film happens to be. It can be useful to compare and contrast with a book or source, sure. But I'd prefer not to insist that there is a "right" answer there-- it shuts down the most creative ideas that such a movie as this seems to evoke.

IMHO, the better works of literature or film literature leave us with more questions than answers. That's what makes us keep going back to them, to see what they say to us "this time."

[–] agilitygirl3 14 years ago

As grown Diane runs through the woods towards the end searching for her daughter Emma, young Diane walks through the mock cemetery for the ‘unborn’ searching for the name Emma (a name she picked out earlier in the movie when talking about baby names). Many people think that because of these metaphors, the movie was trying to deliver an anti-abortion theme. I do not believe this is the case and actually quite opposite – well not opposite, but vastly different. I believe the choosing the art and discussions of Gauguin were no coincidence.

I think it s just an honest take on a girl’s journey through guilt and feelings of unworthiness. She is guilty about her abortion. I highly doubt anyone who has had the procedure does so without guilt. She is ashamed of her (sexual) behavior and this is why the word “slut’ is so upsetting to her. In the moments at the end when her imagined future life is going ‘before her eyes’, she is seeing it through the eyes of one who feels guilt and shame. I think this is why she projected that her future husband would cheat. This is why as grown Diane she states “I don’t deserve this”.

I just finished this movie about 30 minutes ago and am still somewhat confused by it but I had a thought about this scene, where young Diana is looking at the crosses, that everyone seems to think was an anti-abortion take.

My theory is, since the common thought is that anything with older Diana is imagined and her child is named Emma, that the cross bearing the name Emma is not the aborted fetus, but rather the unborn child Diana now will never have, since we learn that she, Diana, is the one that was killed.

That's just my take on it. I'm still too confused to comment on anything else.

All of my life, trying to understand... And I miss you and I love you. That's true - The Kooks