Lureen might have been an only child, too...
Well Goadra, I think that's pertinent because it helps account for her confidence (and relative audacity some would say
).
There's a still from the "Blue Parka" scene that is striking to me. Although it's not framed the same in the film, she sits beneath a portrait of her father and they're very similarly dressed.
http://www.bioscop.cz/_web/_filmy/b_zkrocena_hora/fotografie/nahledy_nejvetsi/115_zkrocena_hora.jpgIt is written that Elizabeth I did the same (positioning portraits of Henry VIII above her seat) to reinforce her lineage since the idea of her regency was so controversial.
Anyway, she + Jack are very similar in that they're high-spirited only children who aren't afraid to go after their dreams — no matter who may object.
[I've posted the following before; forgive me if you've seen this]
Some bemoan their "cold" marriage, but IMO they have it all wrong
. She + Jack had symbiosis
: he let her be who she wanted to be — and to an extent, vice versa. She didn't care about his lack of prospects, and gave him the means to earn a good living in his own right (thus he was able to tell LD, "this is
my house". He wasn't interested, however, in
taking over the business that was her birthright, as some men may have been.) Also, she doesn't expect him to live up to some masculine ideal and be anything that he's not. Many women of the time expected their husbands to "be a man" and might even have taken subtle swipes at his manhood if he weren't. (Madonna, asked about Sean Penn's jealous + controlling nature said, "at least he had the
balls".) This isn't an issue to Lureen.
What is an issue of course, is Jack's baffling lack of attention. I agree that by the dance scene she may be
in the process of putting pieces together, but is still basically in the dark (thus asking "Why . . . Jack?)
People tend to be hard on Lureen for some reason, as if not being primarily a homemaker means she had less of a heart. But she just wanted to be noticed and loved, like anybody else.