MovieChat Forums > We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011) Discussion > Movie blames the mom

Movie blames the mom

posted 10 years ago by mrceci
53 replies | jump to latest

Did anyone else think that this movie implies that Kevin turned out the way he did because of his mom's fault? The movie shows how she's extremely apprehensive about having him (i.e. losing her freedom, the pre-Kevin tomato scene is the happiest we ever see her). Even in the scene where she's giving birth, she's apprehensive about bringing him out into the world.
So once we get into Kevin's infancy part of the movie, the scenes get juxtaposed between Ava not wanting him there (even when he says, you don't like me, you're just used to me, she doesn't correct him) and him acting out. Then when he starts showing violent behavior in his teenage years, the audience is supposed to go, well of course, look at the mother he has...
I've seen other people say that the movie shows how, while the dad is oblivious, she's the only one who perceives his true nature . But I really think the movie doesn't support that theory. I think it's portraying quite the opposite. I think the movie implies she caused it.

[–] donmunk321 9 years ago

I think the movie leave the interpretation up to you, it offers both sides, eg the Mum being distant and not always being perfect and also her trying and Kevin clearly rejecting her no matter what.

It shows that she wasn't the best mum, she had issues but she did try and Kevin was the most responsive son either. It's kinda like the chicken and egg, nature vs nurture.

[–] ladycopine 9 years ago

It wasn't her fault, he was born that way but I think that if she acted differently it would have make a difference, he clearly did all of this because of her coz I think she was the only person he had feelings for, but she never showed the affection and attention he needed and wanted..

[–] donmunk321 9 years ago

You're point contradicts itself my friend, saying it wasn't her fault then saying if she was different then it would have been a different outcome?

By that logic, it was her fault? At least to some extent. But yeah it's a bit of both I would say.

[–] daartist 9 years ago

If anything, it looks to me like the director is going out of his way to show that the kid is just bad.
From the get go, the little monster obviously had something wrong with him and the mom didn't know what to make of it.
She wanted to love the little beast but he deliberately ignored her and went out of his way to be defiant.
I spent the first part of the movie trying to figure out what was wrong with him and decided it might have been oppositional-defiant disorder. And who knows what else.
Mom clearly had no clue how to relate to him and wished he was never born. Which, I think, is perfectly reasonable.
A worse parent would have beat the little monster. The kid was lucky to have a mom who didn't.

[–] eliandegen 8 years ago

Actually, the whole movie is being told from her perspective... it isn't so much that the film blames her, but that she blames herself to some degree. She remembers she didn't want a kid, and that she had the kid, and that she disliked the kid, and that she was convinced the kid was evil, and that maybe, all of this is her fault, but maybe it was all in her head and she made this happen.

[–] 8 years ago

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[–] eliandegen 8 years ago

I agree.

I'm pretty sure it is all her perspective, so it isn't unbiased at all.

Also, if I remember correctly, the father basically thought that maybe it wasn't Kevin's fault the eye thing, but Eva's for leaving the bottle unattended... Again, since it was "through her lens" we won't know if he actually blamed her or if she only felt he blamed her...

I don't know, I think that's precisely one of the reasons the movie is interesting, we don't actually know how everything happened, we know what she recalls happening, and sometimes our present situation kind of warps our memories of past events... At least that's what I felt they were doing throughout the film by framing with flashbacks after the fact, always from her POV.

[–] 8 years ago

[deleted]

[–] thomaxz-tc 8 years ago

There is no such things as evil from Birth, it always from Enviroment or Parrents.

Read Bruce D. Perrys book, "The Boy Who Was Raised As A Dog: What Traumatized Children Can Teach Us About Loss, Love and Healing"

Where he has reaserched, how a pyschotic child become murder.