Shane
A similar theme is played out in Shane (1953). Joey’s father (Van Heflin) is an honest, hardworking homesteader. But when Shane comes along, little Joey (Brandon de Wilde) becomes fascinated with the mysterious loner and his romantic past as a gunfighter. Joey’s mother (Jean Arthur) shows a more than casual interest in the sexy outlaw as well. Though he never truly replaces big Joe as a father, Shane knocks big Joe out in order to take his place in the final showdown with the evil cattle baron (Emile Meyer) and his hired gun (Jack Palance). In Joey’s mind, Shane is the man who courageously stands up to the evil forces and saves the homesteaders, while his father lay on his back with an icepack on his head. For little Joey, the role of savior, mentor and macho hero will always be identified with Shane, rather than his own father.
Fort Apache
For girls, the Electra Complex is ideally resolved when the girl transfers her psychosexual desire for Father onto another eligible, preferably unrelated male. But this ideal resolution is subverted when a possessive father cannot let go of his little girl and allow her to marry the man of her choice. In Fort Apache (1948), Colonel Thursday (Henry Fonda) cannot accept the fact that his daughter (Shirley Temple) is in love with a suitor whom he deems unacceptable. As a member of a distinguished army family, he cannot bear to imagine that his daughter should marry the son of a sergeant. Thursday’s inability to allow his daughter the freedom to choose a husband of her own creates both frustration and compassion in the viewer. Though we deplore Thursday’s stubbornness and unyielding authoritarianism, we understand that his desire to control his daughter’s life comes from a place of love. We sympathize with him because we see that he loves his daughter so much that he is unwilling to let her go. Unfortunately, Thursday only yields to the inevitable in the moment before his death. In his dying breaths, Thursday finally admits that the young suitor is a brave and commendable officer and an acceptable groom for his beloved daughter.
Forbidden Planet
In what may be the most overtly Freudian screenplay ever written, Forbidden Planet (1956) is a sci-fi Oedipal play inspired by Shakespeare’s The Tempest. In the year 2200, a group of astronauts enter the Forbidden Planet, Altair 4, whose entire population has been destroyed by a mysterious, dark force. The only living survivors are the brilliant Dr. Morbius (Walter Pidgeon) and his young daughter, the unabashedly sexy Altaira (Anne Francis). Morbius is a jealous and possessive guardian of his sexually maturing daughter. Until the arrival of the astronauts, he and Altaira lived in complete seclusion and Morbius enjoyed the unrivaled love and attention of his cherished daughter. But when Captain Adams (Leslie Nielsen) enters the scene as a rival for Altaira’s love, Morbius psychically projects his destructive libido through his dreams into an “Id monster” that murders the astronauts. The name Morbius is a reference to the mythological figure of Morpheus, the god of the unconscious world of dreams, hinting at the unconscious origin of Morbius’s powers. Accordingly, Morbius remains completely unaware that it is his own unconscious destructive impulses that are killing the crew. In the end, though his final massive effort to control his own id kills him, Morbius overcomes his desire for sole possession of his daughter. In his dying breaths, he refers to Captain Adams as “Son,” showing that he is finally willing to release his daughter so that she can be possessed by another man—who will then become his son-in-law.
Father’s Blessing
A different twist on the possessive father theme is played out in Disney’s The Little Mermaid (1989). Ariel is a mermaid who falls in love with a mortal. Her father, King Triton, cannot accept the notion that his beloved daughter should marry a lowly “fish eater.” For Triton, the Romeo and Juliet plot of the star-crossed young lovers is even more poignant, because if his daughter chooses to marry a mortal and live on land, she can never return to the sea. Triton, however, is able to overcome his desire to possess and control his daughter. In the end, he lets her go, losing the physical presence of his cherished Ariel, but gaining her eternal love and respect.
In The Little Mermaid, King Triton shows his ultimate acceptance of his daughter’s autonomy by blessing her with human mortality. The traditional father’s blessing of the daughter and her groom is an ancient custom that dates back to the days when daughters were literally regarded as their father’s private property. The father would eventually “give away” his daughter on her wedding day, but only to a groom that he considered acceptable.
The father’s blessing could be given freely or jealously withheld. For Tevye (Topol) in Fiddler on the Roof (1971), there is nothing more important in life than “tradition.” But when his daughter chooses to marry a gentile, even Tevye’s enormous love for his children cannot move him to accept their intermarriage and give his blessing to the union. Forced to choose between his beloved daughter and his cherished tradition, Tevye stays true to his faith by withholding his blessing and renouncing his daughter forever.
Chinatown
Perhaps the most possessive father ever depicted on film is Noah Cross (John Huston) in Chinatown (1974). Cross is a multi-millionaire megalomaniac who must control everything and everyone around him. The external plot of the film centers around Cross’s scheme to dominate the entire city of Los Angeles. But the driving force behind the film is the internal plot, in which Cross desires to own and control the lives of his daughters in ways that would make Freud himself blush. Cross’s possessive and inappropriate lust for domination over the city of Los Angeles provides parallel symbolism for his lust for his daughters. The city, like a young daughter, must be allowed to grow and develop in her own way. When the founding fathers use their inordinate power and control to dominate her, she will wither and die like a flower kept from the sun.
In the distant backstory of the film, Cross had an incestuous relationship with his daughter, Evelyn (Faye Dunaway), resulting in the birth of Sophie (Nandu Hinds)—who is Cross’s daughter and also his granddaughter. Cross’s desire to possess both Evelyn and Sophie leads him to kill his son-in-law, Sophie’s stepfather (Darrell Zwerling), who is trying to take Sophie away. The only person standing between Cross and Sophie is Evelyn (the girl’s mother and sister). At the end of the movie, Evelyn is also killed. After destroying both of his rivals, Cross walks away with Sophie under his protective arm. The viewer can only imagine what their relationship will be like.
Mother
The central neurotic conflict within the Oedipal complex is the incest taboo, the child’s psychosexual desire for the opposite-sex parent, which is forbidden in all civilized societies. The child’s incestuous desire for sexual union with the parent is so socially unacceptable and so psychologically troubling that it can never be expressed consciously. The illicit desire remains suppressed deep within the unconscious, expressing itself only as indistinct feelings of guilt and emotional tension between family members. While Freud’s focus on infantile sexuality may have been overstated, the Oedipal theme of obsessive attachment, the need to monopolize the affections of our loved ones, is an integral force in the psychology of family dynamics.
Often times, there is an absent mother figure within the possessive father film plot. The lack of a wife for the father and the lack of a mother for the daughter increases the pathos for both characters. In The Little Mermaid, Triton’s lack of any female companionship other than Ariel creates a greater need for him to keep his daughter as a primary love interest. The young suitor, in these cases, becomes a true rival, as the daughter has taken the place of her mother as the sole love object for her father. When Ariel marries and moves away, Triton will be left emotionally isolated and alone. Furthermore, the fact that Ariel has no compassionate mother figure makes her relationship with Triton even more strained. A mother who understands the stirrings of love in a young girl’s heart could sway a stubborn father and convince him that forbidding romance between two young lovers is a futile, self-destructive pursuit. The absence of a mother figure to play a mediating role between Triton and Ariel makes the breach
between these two characters appear irreparable.
Oedipus Wrecks
In Manhattan (1979), Woody Allen’s character recalls writing an autobiographical story about his mother entitled “The Castrating Zionist.” When an overbearing mother smothers her son with obsessive love, we see the results of an Oedipal complex left completely unresolved. Rather than identifying with the father and developing as an independent individual, this character remains completely emotionally attached to his mother. This person cannot stand up to his dominating mother, who showers him with love and affection while simultaneously emasculating his feeble attempts at autonomy. In Oedipus Wrecks, Woody Allen’s segment from New York Stories (1989), Sheldon (Woody Allen) has a prototypical Jewish mother. She is perpetually deriding his love interests and undermining his attempts at romance. Sheldon’s mother becomes magically transformed into a massive apparition hovering over New York City. The joke makes sense, because we understand the humiliation that Sheldon feels over his infantile subjugation to his domineering mother. The joke is funny because this sense of embarrassment is amplified into ridiculous proportions when the mother figure is projected out from his unconscious and onto the sky over the East River. By sabotaging her son’s romances, the devouring mother reveals her unconscious desire to eliminate the rivals for her son’s love, so she can keep him all to herself.
Psycho
The domineering mother motif escalates to terrifying proportions in Psycho (1960). Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) is so emotionally enmeshed with his psychologically overpowering mother that he could not bear to see her marry another man. In a fit of Oedipal rage, he kills his rival for his mother’s love, and he kills his mother as well. The ensuing guilt and isolation results in a psychotic split in Norman’s psyche. In his “normal” state, Norman is the feeble-willed mama’s boy who jumps at his mother’s beck and call. In his psychotic state, Norman is his mother—a harsh and bitter woman who emasculates her son with ridicule and psychological domination. Norman’s existence as a split-personality psychotic is volatile enough, but when Norman becomes attracted to Marion (Janet Leigh), a sexy young woman, the Mother side of Norman’s psyche goes ballistic. Norman, as his mother, slashes Marion to death in the shower. In this brutal act, both parts of Norman’s personality gain primal satisfaction. Norman gets to thrust his phallic weapon into Marion’s naked body, and Norman’s mother gets to destroy her rival for Norman’s love.
The Graduate
In The Graduate (1967), young Ben (Dustin Hoffman) is seduced by Mrs. Robinson (Anne Bancroft), a woman old enough to be his mother. The sexual relationship between Ben and Mrs. Robinson is only symbolically Oedipal, but it is crystal clear that Mrs. Robinson plays the role of a mother figure in Ben’s life. She comes along at a time when Ben is “drifting.” A recent college graduate, Ben has no direction in life. Mrs. Robinson provides the type of physical love and attention that Ben needs but cannot get from his real mother, because of the incest taboo. Nevertheless, the fact that Mr. Robinson (Murray Hamilton) is Ben’s father’s best friend and partner makes Ben’s relationship with Mrs. Robinson a source of great anxiety. Eventually, Ben resolves his Oedipal complex by transferring his libidinous desire onto Elaine (Katherine Ross), the Robinson’s only daughter. Though he is no longer symbolically pursuing his mother, Ben’s problems increase when Mrs. Robinson assumes the role of possessive mother. Mrs. Robinson sees Elaine as a rival for Ben’s affection. She also sees Ben as a rival for Elaine’s affection. So Mrs. Robinson sabotages Ben and Elaine’s budding romance by telling Elaine that Ben raped her.
Though his part is underplayed, Mr. Robinson undergoes the most psychological turmoil of anyone. Ben has been “like a son” to Mr. Robinson. Imagine how he must have felt when he learned that this beloved boy not only raped his wife, but is also trying to steal his precious daughter? Mr. Robinson plays the doubly burdened role of possessive father and cuckolded husband. The plot resolves, rather unrealistically, with Ben winning Elaine back—much to the chagrin of Mr. and Mrs. Robinson. The uneasy, ambiguous final moments of the film imply that rather than being free of the tyranny of their parents, they are doomed to relive the Oedipal drama when they start their own family and become parents themselves.
Harold and Maude
In Hal Ashby’s cult classic, Harold and Maude (1971), Harold (Bud Cort) is a rather odd young man, seeking attention and intimacy from his cold and oblivious mother (Vivian Pickles). Since he cannot gain her positive attention, he gets her negative attention by staging fake suicides. Harold’s isolation and loneliness is exacerbated by the complete absence of a father figure. The viewer is left to assume that his father is dead, though the exact whereabouts of Harold’s father are never revealed. Harold’s world is thoroughly rocked when he develops a friendship with Maude (Ruth Gordon), an ebullient and life-loving woman about sixty years his senior. Harold begins to identify with Maude as a role model. Like Harold, Maude is a non-conformist, a free spirit, a square peg. They share an affinity for funerals and a general disregard for authority figures. Maude becomes a mentor for Harold, providing him with a new life-affirming philosophy to replace his self-loathing obsession with death and suicide. Maude also becomes a positive mother figure, encouraging Harold to love others and to live for himself. Harold transfers his unrequited love for his mother onto Maude, and they have a passionate affair. The shocked reaction of civilized society to Harold and Maude’s iconoclastic and taboo love is symbolized by humorous remonstrations from three representatives of Harold’s superego: Harold’s Uncle Victor, a military general who represents law and order; Harold’s priest, who represents religion; and Harold’s psychiatrist, who rebukes Harold by telling him that a proper Oedipal complex reveals itself in a sexual attraction to a mother figure—not a grandmother figure.
Harold and Maude’s unique romance ends abruptly when Maude commits suicide on her 80th birthday. Harold is completely devastated when Maude tells him that she took a lethal dose of pills. He has difficulty understanding the full extent of Maude’s spiritual philosophy, which is based on the idea that life must be lived to the fullest, and then released willingly, without holding on to the attachments of the physical world. When Harold declares his love to Maude, she replies in her dying breaths: “Good Harold … go out and love some more.” At her moment of death, Maude inspires Harold to complete the resolution of his Oedipal complex. Like a mother bird pushing her chick out of the nest, Maude forces Harold to fly on the strength of his own wings. Harold’s new sense of freedom is symbolized in a final fake suicide, in which he propels his car off a cliff. The car was a gift from his mother, a symbol of her inability to understand her son. Harold transformed the car into a miniature hearse, representing his death obsession and his anger towards his mother. Through his final fake suicide, Harold is reborn as a new man, free of the attachments of childhood complexes, free of his neurotic mother issues, and free of his fear of living. When the car crashes, the viewer thinks he is inside of it—driven to self-destruction by grief over Maude’s death—but then we see that Harold is still on top of the cliff. He walks away, playing a tune on the banjo that Maude gave him, the symbol of their enduring love.
Rushmore
In Wes Anderson’s Rushmore (1998), Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman) is searching for a mother figure. After Max’s mother died when he was a young boy, Max transferred his maternal love to Rushmore, the posh private school that his mother got him a scholarship to attend. For Max, the lonely teenage son of a poor barber (Seymour Cassel), Rushmore represents the love and high aspirations that his lost mother had for him. When Max is threatened with expulsion from Rushmore, he suddenly develops an obsessive crush on a Rushmore teacher, the attractive and alluring Miss Cross (Olivia Williams). At the same time, Max develops a special friendship with Herman Blume (Bill Murray), a multimillionaire who is ashamed of his spoiled-rotten sons.
Herman and Max find the type of father/son relationship that they want in each other, and simulate this relat
ionship in their friendship. However, when Herman falls in love with Miss Cross, a classic father/son Oedipal rivalry for Miss Cross’ love ensues. By the end of the film, Max shows that he has overcome his Oedipal complex. He has adjusted to life outside of Rushmore, and he has learned to accept and identify with his real father. Max has also given up his unrealistic dreams of a romantic relationship with Miss Cross, and even plays a key part in bringing Miss Cross and Herman back together. By letting go of his childish attachment to his replacement mother figure (Rushmore) and his replacement father figure (Herman), Max leaves behind the relics of childhood and enters the adult world of mature relationships—symbolized by his lovely new girlfriend, Margaret Yang (Sara Tanaka).
Movies and the Mind Page 5
