Possible Spoilers so be careful before reading.
At about 64 minutes into the movie when Myra is at the train station purchasing a ticket the camera zooms into the clasp on her purse. It is a bedazzled "M". There was no mention of the charm before or after this shot. Does anybody know of the significance?
If its the scene that I think....was this when she fled Roy's estate after confessing to his mother? I think Roy's mother's name was Mary. It was her purse. I think Myra stole the purse/clasp from Mary before she fled. Not that she wanted to but I think it was to show that she had accepted that she was what she was and Roy was what he was and that there would be no future for a girl like her with him. By taking it, she says, this is what I am, and maybe she thought it would stop her from changing her mind and going back. Like burning the bridge lest she get weak and return to Roy. She was trying to do what was right by doing wrong?? Weird.
shareTo: julielambert99
Insightful. Thanks for your reply.
I know the mother's name is Mary, but her name is Myra so it can just as easily be her own purse. Besides, she is shown with the purse earlier in the film so it's definitely her purse.
Perhaps instead of the M, Whale was trying to direct our attention to the picture on the purse. A man and two women. No idea if the scene is something we should be familiar with or not. I'm guessing maybe it's a man and two women at Waterloo Bridge, signifying her return to her old profession.
Or maybe it was just a random, poor closeup with no meaning.
I thought the close-up on the bag was meant to highlight the fact Myra suddenly has money and lots of it. She gets a first class single ticket, pays for it, and still has money left to put back in her purse. As I recall, she didn't have any money before; at least not enough to pay her rent and other debts which were less than the ticket cost.
Perhaps she stole the money from the family or it was given to her but I don't even think that's the point. Immediately upon returning she goes right back to her 'job'. Again she claims she's desperate for rent money. For a moment she has second thoughts but then tries to get the guy back.
When she returns home she pays the landlady for a week's rent so she did have money. What I think it means is she turns tricks because she likes it. That's where she's comfortable, in the gutter. Whether she has money or not she's going to keep doing the same thing.
When she sees Roy she yells at him that she hates his mother, his family, him; she was happy before she met him... That means she had been content living her life but once she met him and realized what else is possible; what she can never have, it makes her miserable. How could she be satisfied with her knowing she could have had better; a man who loves her, a family that accepts her, marriage, wealth, a life but due to her choices that door is closed.
Woman, man! That's the way it should be Tarzan. [Tarzan and his mate]
I may be mistaken, but at the end, following the bomb, doesn't the shot show her purse lying on the sidewalk of the bridge, with that clasp on the purse showing? If I'm correct about that, then I think the earlier shot of the clasp on the purse was solely to set it up as an easy visual reference for later, so we'll know she was killed.
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