MovieChat Forums > Green Dolphin Street (1947) Discussion > Did the father commit suicide?

Did the father commit suicide?


I'm wondering what it meant when the priest told Marguerite "Your father does not need you now. He has quietly joined your mother." I mean obviously the father had died, but it seems awfully coincidental that he asked to be alone after the mother died and then suddenly he's dead, too.

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I think the father just died of a broken heart.

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It was simply a broken heart, as he had been so very in love with his wife.

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They were Catholics. I think it highly unlikely he committed suicide.

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He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good... St. Matthew 5:45

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i DID take it to mean he had committed suicide. he seemed pretty strong just before that (although he certainly COULD have had a heart attack.)

i don't think it's clear in the film. was it spelled out clearly in the book? (the fact that suicide goes against some religious doctrines doesn't stop people from doing it.)

Good film. more info on the Maori at

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Māori_people

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Though it's not clear, in the movie, how he died, I did not assume suicide either. Dying of natural causes from an intensely broken heart seems more the case, especially given the plot of the movie. I'm not sure why you assumed they were Catholic though.

1. Their specific faith was not mentioned but I doubt they were Catholic. In fact, based on where they were, near the English Channel, it's more likely they were Anglican; as were the nuns.

2. Suicide, in the Catholic Church, is a sin. Had they been Catholic I'd say you were right. It's unlikely he would have killed himself. The reason he'd do it is because he'd miss his wife and he'd want to be with her. The act of killing himself would have made that last part less likely and that would defeat the purpose of doing it in the first place.

3. I don't know how suicide is viewed in the Anglican Church but if I'm right and that's what they were it might not have the same impact as in the Catholic Church. I'm not saying it was condoned but it may not have had the same kind of repercussions as in the Catholic Church. For one, had her father committed suicide, I don't think Marguerite would have been able to become a Catholic nun. In those days, what someone's family did would affect what they could do.

4. Early on in the movie, we learn Sophie, Marguerite and Marianne's mother, came very close to flinging herself off a cliff. The nun who went to let her know Dr. Ozanne was back in town is the one who kept her from doing it. If in her despair she considered it, perhaps they were the kind of people to end it all when things got too difficult.

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modonin:

It was quite obvious they were Catholics by the way they acted in and out of Church. Anglicans of the early 19th Century did not have such high church services. They did not then call their priests "Father" or even as a rule refer to them as priests, but as rectors or vicars. They did not cross themselves. This was a (fictional) Channel Island. In the British Cannel Islands the people were mostly of French etniticity and mostly Catholic.

In the Anglican Church at the time, suicide was regarded with about the same disdain as in the Roman Catholic Church. But it's a moot point, as they were not Anglicans.

Further, having a father who committed suicide would not have disqualified a woman from becoming a nun.

For someone who admittedly doesn't know much about either Catholic or Anglican practice or theology and didn't even understand the ethninticity of the islanders or the location or political status of the island, you have developed decided oppionons from your rife speculation.

All this said and done, there was no reason to suppose the old man committed suicide. He was in poor health, and he died from the stress of grief. It seems that a large segment of our present society regards suicide as some kind of devilish sacramment and gets an almost orgasimistic thrill out of the idea.

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He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good... St. Matthew 5:45

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oldblackandwhite says > For someone who admittedly doesn't know much about either Catholic or Anglican practice or theology and didn't even understand the ethninticity of the islanders or the location or political status of the island, you have developed decided oppionons from your rife speculation.
You sound a bit hostile in your response. I have no idea why. I never claimed to be a religious or Channel island scholar. In fact, I mostly agreed with your belief that he did not commit suicide and everything else I said was conditional (if, likely, etc.). I merely expressed my opinion based on what I saw in the movie. Who knows what the author or director had in mind.

What I didn't understand is why you seemed so sure they were Catholic; it's never mentioned in the movie. You say they didn't behave like they were Anglican. I'll have to take your word on that because I don't know the first thing about the Anglican Church. However, I am Catholic and there are a few things in the movie that don't point to them being Catholic either.

It seems that a large segment of our present society regards suicide as some kind of devilish sacramment and gets an almost orgasimistic thrill out of the idea.
Yeah, it seems you're right about that. These days people seem to have a lot of strange ideas.

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My aunt and uncle who were married about 60 years died within hours of each other. My aunt had been sick for several years and my uncle was her primary caretaker. When my aunt passed all our thoughts were focused on our uncle, whom we thought would have an especially hard time dealing with the loss of his wife. We needn't have worried because my uncle laid down to rest and died in his sleep of "natural causes" within hours of my aunt.

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