MovieChat Forums > Afternoon Delight (2013) Discussion > And the moral of the story is.....

And the moral of the story is.....

posted 10 years ago by kriziavalentine
4 replies | jump to latest

Juno Temple is my favorite actress, and I really like Kathryn Hahn, so I gave this a watch. It was really engaging, but by the end I kind of felt dissapointed, because I felt like the movie said "don't take a risk in your boring life" even though I'm pretty sure it meant to say "don't take what seems like a boring life for granted, be grateful for the good things and don't mess it up" I felt sad because I think McKenna really wanted to get better, maybe not stop doing the sex work, but be respected in a different aspect; I think she took pride in herself being a good nanny and she was on the road to continue to be sober. I just felt like, although the Kathryn Hahn character was likeable, she ended up being the uptight suburban type she seemed to loathe that she had become, because she really didn't give McKenna a chance. Obviously, it's not a great idea to have a hooker in your home, but things aren't that black and white. Anyways, I just felt that the morals fell flat, and it was sad how Mckenna was just discarded. The spark was reginited between her and her husband, but for how long? Obsviously there are some deeper issues that pushed her far enough to make the choices she made.

[–] LovesConfusingJoy 10 years ago

But McKenna kind ruined her own chances by tempting the husbands and sleeping with one and being very nonchalant about it

[–] dlr611 10 years ago

Bc she did it out of spite, and I don't blame her! They treated her like she was only good for sex and defined her by what she DID rather than who she WAS, so of course she's gonna react! She kinda throw it back in their face like "hey if this is what u think I am, then here Ya go" type thing. I think they all acted quite ridiculous, uptight, and snobby to McKenna...like she was only there to spice up Rachel's life but not to be taken seriously. Even the op said "it's not a good idea to have a hooker in your house"....uhhh, y not?? What she did for a living in no way disrupted their life or "happy home" (in fact, made it better!) until they treated her as if she was garbage...which is what they get for doing that! And what about Jeff?? He was the older adult there and she was a young drunk (alcoholic too) and vulnerable girl in her 20s that was single! He should have been the one to stop things before they went too far.....my only complaint w the movie was that McKenna totally got the short end of the stick and was judged from the get go without apology or correction. Ugh.

[–] xlostincyberx 9 years ago

I agree with this, they blew it with her the way they judged her. I've had really amazing friends that do that line of work, looking back they are the nicest people I know. All of the sudden McKenna wasn't good enough to have a princess party when she was so happy to do it, and went out on her own time and bought the girls presents with her own money. To me that could have been the thing that could have triggered McKenna to think about finding a man and having a family, the kids would have an absolute blast and would probably ask the boring soccer mom's if McKenna can watch them again, also Mckenna could have been a positive part of their little community. Instead they decided to pretty much tell her she was only good enough to be a whore, so she's like okay sure...I'll play that game. They were such hypocrites. McKenna was honest about who she was the whole time and she wasn't a bad person, and she didn't even need to change just to fit their image of what is acceptable to their fake friends.

[–] cpoet 9 years ago

I think the lesson was: you can change your life, even if you aren't successful at it the first time you try.

Initially, Rachel was discontented with her life. She tries exploring Twitter (heh), strip club, exciting new little gal pal, etc. Then Rachel swung way out wide from her norm by going on the hooker appointment, but that was disgusting to her and caused self-loathing. So the pendulum swings way back and she falls into line again with her peer group, i.e. you don't hire hookers as nannies, and she refuses to let McKenna babysit little girls because, "bad role model."

But in spite of heading down the wrong path several times, Rachel came out better and happier.

Same with McKenna. She had a good start once, with her sobriety, and the finale showed her outside, interacting and laughing with people, so we will know she didn't go jam a needle in her arm or suicide or degenerate into back alley blowjobs. She can still change, because as she said, "I have a million places I can go."