In The Hours, Richard displays multiple parallels to Septimus, such as as their death by jumping from a window and how they're aren't understood by the people around them. In addition to parallel between the two characters, they also have key differences that make their stories different like their backgrounds and what exactly pushes them over the edge.
I really sympathized with the Richard in the early timeline because he seemed like a happy child who just wanted to make a cake with his mom. It goes from that to her mom kissing Lilly which I think would be a really strange thing for someone to see when they're so young. But the thing is he doesn't even really ask what or why she did that, he just sits there silently not knowing what to make of what happened. I think childhood Richard was there to more or less represent the audience in these scenes. He's very quiet in the car ride except when he tries to tell his mom he loves her. Then he gets extremely vocal trying to stop his mom from driving away, because he knew and we knew that something was wrong and she shouldn't be left alone. Overall I feel childhood Richard is such a good character in how he gets me to feel like I'm in the movie because he reacts to a lot of things the same way I probably would.
Lastly we have present day Richard which is a lot like Septimus. They're background experiences cause them to perceive the world differently from others and have the ones they love for seek outside help. Septimus was in a war and is dealing with PTSD while Richards mother turns out to have left him and he became fatally ill, both of which has lasting effects that is too much for Lucrezia/Clarissa to help fix. The spectacle (thanks Film Studies) would definitely be Richard's suicide. It was a really shocking event, even though we read about a similar event in Mrs. Dalloway, reading it doesn't have the same feel as watching someone take the leap.
If you haven't seen this film, I'd highly recommend it. It really depicts the novel Mrs. Dalloway amazingly and leaves the audience thinking about what they just experienced.
I think the character of Richard depicts both Septimus and Peter. Richard judges Clarissa and her parties in the same way that Peter does in the novel, and is a character from her past that really knows how to get under Clarissa's skin. I liked that you also made the comparison between Rezia and Clarissa, because it shows how the story lines of Septimus/Rezia and Peter/Richard/Clarissa intersect. The mental bond between Clarissa and Septimus in the novel becomes much more personal in the movie because the characters that depict them are really good friends. It isn't some kind of mystical connection; they know each other. This movie made me feel like I had a deeper understanding of who Woolf's characters were meant to be and the significance they had to her.
ReplyDeleteI think that Richard from the movie manages to take on the role of the character we sympathize for most. You made good points about how there are similarities between Richard and Septimus. One similarity being that they are both the characterize that we feel for the most, but the movie and book do this in two different ways. The book has the relationship with Rezia that gets the reader to want Septimus to get better, but in the movie it is different. The reason that I really enjoyed the character Richard was the parallel story of him as a child. This story made Richard's suicide so hard to bear, and I agree with you that we sympathize with the young Richard.
ReplyDeleteI think that young Richard also serves to develop his mother's struggles by increasing the pressure on her to stay with her family. It's questionable whether she actually cares for her husband, but she does genuinely care for Richard, which makes leaving (by what ever means: death or running away) much more difficult. It also makes the decision to leave much more morally questionable from our perspective. She has the right to leave, but does Richard not also have the right to a mother? She doesn't regret her decision in the end (though she is sad), even after her son's death (I don't mean to suggest that it was her fault), because she says that she didn't have a choice, so I guess, in a sense, it all goes to reinforce the whole 'freedom above all else' theme. Like, even if the stakes are as high as possibly ruining your son's life, you can't let yourself be trapped in a confining position/role.
ReplyDeleteAlso, an unrelated note: I was expecting Richard to correspond to Richard in the book, and was initially very confused when he turned out to be a depressed artist. I wonder why they named him Richard given how little in common he has with his namesake. (The only similarity I can think of is his relationship with Clarissa, and even that is quite different in the movie).