Catching up with this great discussion ...
Doesn't that happen pretty often though? That a great person will put up with a sub-par relationship?
Oh, maybe. I wouldn't know anything about that!
2) One thing we know about Cassie is that she's an aspiring nurse — therefore drawn to the idea of rehabilitating those who seem in need of healing, which Ennis certainly did!
3) She was probably infatuated with Ennis to a point that logic ("it's been X number of years") takes a backseat. And nothing keeps infatuation alive like mystery, which Ennis had in spades.
Good points!
Alma sure seemed turned on by Ennis (even 11 years into their marriage and with all their problems)! So he must have been doing something right.
You think? My impression on the "if you don't want no more of my kids" night is that when they turn their separate ways, she's not all that disappointed.
Why do you think it would be too much? I mean, this movie (on one of it's many levels) is about confronting the topic of sexuality- focused primarily on gay male sexuality, but heterosexual female sexuality is at least addressed in different ways (through the lense of several very different characters) and the topic of bisexuality in men can also be said to be at issue within the context of the film/ story. I think this leaves a bit of a skewed picture of female sexuality. Granted the range of the film is sort of narrow given the relatively small number of major characters.
I'm in the "it would be too much" camp, partly for the reason you mention in your last sentence. Do we ever even see two women in the same scene together, aside from Alma and her daughters or Lureen and her mom? Oh yeah, Cassie and Alma Jr. But otherwise, there's no evidence that any of these women have ever even
met any other women.
I guess it might have been possible for Ang to have suggested something in a very subtle way -- for example, showed two women extras in the background together, the way we keep seeing pairs of men. But I think the goal of the movie was less to explore the range of human sexuality than to keep the focus very much on Jack's and Ennis' relationship, to look at how
their sexuality and feelings for each other, and the restrictions put upon them, affected those particular men and everyone else in their lives.
It's also interesting that Ennis doesn't ask Alma Jr. if she's in love... only whether Kurt loves her. What's up with that?
IMO, this
isn't because he doesn't care how Alma Jr. feels toward Kurt. It's more about what Ennis has recently realized regarding his relationship with Jack. Ennis always knew he loved Jack, IMO. But that wasn't enough to spur him to action. But when he finds the shirts (and contemplates Cassie's "girls don't fall in love with fun") he realizes how much
Jack loved
him, that's when he fully understands how much he blew it. What he learned was, if someone (whom you love) loves you, don't waste that opportunity. He's assuming that Alma Jr. loves Kurt (as he loved Jack), and is saying, "If he loves you, that's what matters; you definitely should marry him."
I think this whole scene, which the first couple of times I saw the movie felt a little tacked on, is a really wonderful way of showing how the experience has affected Ennis and what he has learned from it. And it lets the movie end on a slightly more hopeful note than the story did. Alma Jr.'s role is to show the "what if": What if, when Ennis was 19, he had felt
he could do what
he wanted, and be with the person
he loved.