After her life as a tramp, she decides to go straight and ropes her poor detective husband into a marriage where she KNOWS she can't have children and watches as the poor guy tears out his heart with sympathy in the cab scene.
No wonder he committed suicide.
His dying was the highlight of the movie, apart from Lee Grant's shoplifting subplot...he was an irrational bastard who never once thought about how things were for his wife, it was just how it all suited him.
shareThe husband may have called her a tramp but that doesn't make it so. She went with the Tami guy, got pregnant by accident (remember not much birth control then) and had the very limited options to women in such a position in those days. Think of the context, the depression years, leading into the war years, life must have seemed very bewildering for young people wondering if the world was going crazy. So don't you know of any woman these days who has gotten pregnant out of wedlock? (and they do have birth control available.) Do you call all of them tramps? Are you like the husband who believes no one should ever make a mistake? And that no one should be forgiven? The William Bendix character understands that the Arthur character made a terrible mistake but can be forgiven-taking into account his life as a totality (his war record.) The same attitude should apply to Mary also, seeing her entire character and history and all she gave towards a marriage with a work-obsessed husband. And nowhere does it say she "roped" her husband into marriage. And think of the agony she suffers, wanting to have children, probably not able to because of the mistake she made while young, not to mention the physical pain she probably suffered that caused the situation. Do you assume the husband was a virgin when he got married? If it is socially acceptable for men to fool around before marriage, why does it make a woman a tramp to do the same? A mistake does not make a person a tramp. And nothing in her life indicates otherwise.
shareOh I see SHE'S the victim! Someone made her take up with a gangster, enjoy the high life, bed down with him (knowing that was required), and then the poor girls gets knocked up and scared for live from a botched abortion.
Or, or like you said, it was the war years, depression era, had a run in her stockings, rainy Monday etc. etc taht made her do it.
Yer right. There was no birth control except for rubbers or pulling out but that woulda made tough guy boyfriend angry. Poor, poor girl. She mighta not got that new mink coat.
And the lousy hard nosed detective husband she wasn't truthful with, probably knowing FULL WELL before they got married that he wanted kids, that worked like a dog to provide for her is just terrible. He's terrible in his reaction!!!
He shoulda been understanding, sympathetic, and forgiving. SO WHAT that she knew the reason why they couldn't start a family, making him and her run in circles with doctors. SO WHAT that she woulda kept it up if this case hadn't suddenly cropped up exposing her. He may have tortured himself forever thinking it was his fault.
SO WHAT! After all SHE'S THE VICTIM!
Now.... why didn't I see that?
I fail to see how her HUSBAND deserves any sympathy. Where he's concerned once you make ONE mistake you're no good and decide to burn in hell for it. Oh wait, that's YOUR logic, was her husband that was killed at the end of the movie your daddy or something and you're angry about losing him? Is that it? Is shumbody having issues because they miss their pwecious detective daddy?
AND, since we're on the subject, you should have no problem offering up YOUR track record that shows that you have never, in your whole life done ANYTHING wrong, and what more never lied to anybody about anything that you ever did. Come on, it's so easy to either be right or wrong, prove it.
There are wrongs and there are WRONGS. Mary should have told her husband what he was getting when they first started dating.
Oh yeah that's going to make GREAT dinner conversation. 'Yeah I like this restaurant, oh by the way, a few years ago I got pregnant and had an abortion, are we on for tomorrow night?' You'd do that in a heartbeat if it was you, right?
share
I was convinced at first that the OP was doing an over-the-top parody of the Kirk Douglas character, but it seems he was actually being serious. Disturbing. This thread says almost nothing about the film, and quite a lot about the OP's obvious psycho-sexual problems ... problems quite similar to those of the the Kirk Douglas character.
Sympathy is lessened because she did not reveal she could never have children; and that's why there is so much anger and bitterness: Deception and subterfuge.
You stupid, clumsy labouring boy.
No one in this thread has brought up the incredible hatred and disgust Kirk feels towards the abortionist before he found out about his wife's secret, and then have to bear the abortionist's shyster rub the situation in his face.
sharemark_shleck-1 says, "Sympathy is lessened because she did not reveal she could never have children; and that's why there is so much anger and bitterness: Deception and subterfuge."
"Did NOT reveal"? She definitely DID reveal this to her husband during their marriage, as he even asked her in the station house, maybe sarcastically, "Is that why you can't have children?".
The "anger and bitterness" McLeod expresses comes about only after Mary's earlier relationships with Tami are revealed to him, and only then does he ask if the abortion was the reason she can't have children. But it's obvious that he was aware she couldn't have children from early in their marriage, so she had to reveal this to him long before.
Of course, McLeod is an angry, cynical and bitter person to begin with, and his general sanctimonious attitude is a defense mechanism through which he attempts to distance himself from his father's failure. He then directs this attitude onto Mary for her failures, and sees them reflecting directly on him, as well (as, subconsciously, he assumes his father's failures to also be his own).
novastar_6 says > Oh yeah that's going to make GREAT dinner conversation.'Yeah I like this restaurant, oh by the way, a few years ago I got pregnant and had an abortion, are we on for tomorrow night?' You'd do that in a heartbeat if it was you, right?She didn't have to tell him at dinner or even on the first date but when she realized things were getting serious and not just a series of dinner dates for laughs, she had an obligation to come clean.
The victim? Nah, she's just a woman who actually got lucky and found out sooner than she would have the type of man she was married to, and got out.
Congrats to her.
Short Cut, Draw Blood
montrossboc-1 says > The victim? Nah, she's just a woman who actually got lucky and found out sooner than she would have the type of man she was married to, and got out. Congrats to her.Your comments show a serious lack of understanding.
Lack of understanding? This is a movie, and my interpretations of the circumstances of said movie are the correct ones to me, and that is all that matters to me, for I am the beholder.
Short Cut, Draw Blood
@Mike
Uh--WHAT? First of all, Mary had a life BEFORE she married Jim---if this movie was made today, she would have told him straight to his face, "Look here, you self-righteous son-of-a b****, I had a life BEFORE I met your sanctimonious a**! I don't have to account to you for a damn thing I did BEFORE I met you! Did you help me pay for it? Hell naw,you didn't! I did! So, to quote Big Sean, I don't give a fck about you or what you think about me! And if you don't like it, well, shut the fck up then!" I mean the way he acted when he found out,you'd think she'd cheated on him, or something! Obviously, she was young and naive, net a guy she thought loved her, but it turned out he was just using her for a quickie or whatever. And she wasn't ready to care for a baby, so she went to the abortionist (which, from what I've read, was dangerous as hell for a pregnant women back in those pre-Roe vs. Wade times. Mainly because since abortion was illegal then, the only way a women could get a safe and clean abortion was if she had enough money to secretary pay off a doctor who would do it. It she didn't, she was subject to what used to be called "back alley butchers", people who would do abortions that sometimes didn't have much medical training----and that why some women who got ended up never having kids or risked dying from improperly done procedures. So going to get an abortion in those days was literally taking your life into your own hands as a woman.)
What he should have gotten mad about were the conditions that forced women into getting illegal abortions back in those days, but being a 50s film, or course they didn't take it that far. But,anyway, I was glad when Mary finally got tired of Jim going off on her for not being perfect. She called him out on his bull****, told him about himself, then left his a**. He deserved that for being such an unfeeling d***.
mike-848 says > Oh I see SHE'S the victim!...Well said! I agree with every single word and I love the tone in which the comments were written. What I can't believe is there are people on here defending Mary and blaming her husband. It blows my mind.
"After her life as a tramp"? LOL You are surely either a troll or a time traveler from the 1800's. Congrats on learning to use the Internets.
shareFor anyone who truly thought of Mary as a tramp, only goes to prove the filmmakers point.
There are a lot of men out there who are vindictive, controlling, delusional, and bottled up with rage just like Jim.
She.
A.) Fell in love with another man. A big difference. She didn't realize it was a "fling" until he told her that he was married. Which she then ended it. It might make her naive, young, and dumb for being duped that easily. Hardly a tramp in the least bit. She was the one very compassionate and truly caring person in the movie. Jim on the other hand was not. At least not until he realizes how truly wrong his views were.
B.) I don't know what the views were back in the 50s. I take it a female engaging in sex, and getting pregnant pre-marriage was probably considered a huge no-no. A pretty disgusting and looked down on act. Probably one that was still pretty common despite the times they were living in. So Mary carrying a child, with no man to boot probably would mean she'd been ostracized from her social world.
It's not very realistic to expect or think most attractive women didn't engage in any sex pre-marriage. Only Jim would be under that delusional. The odds of a fairly attractive female in her 20s being a virgin is not very likely, even during those times. So she had a relationship with another guy before Jim came along. It hardly makes her a slut. That's just Jim's perception and whacked out reality where everything has to be pure, and innocent, or everything has to be completely dirty and bad. He saw no middle ground at all. It was obvious then he didn't have a healthy or sound mind at all. Maybe even a bit dangerous one?
Any rational human being wouldn't think her entire situation was that big of a deal at all. One might be upset, and angry, but one wouldn't look at her at complete disgust like he did. He expected perfection out of everyone. He wasn't the least bit stable and reasonable in any regard.
His idea of reality was out of whack. I thought that entire subplot of that story was suppose to make the viewer obvious to that. And finally allowed Jim to come to the same conclusion as well.
I know this thread is way old but this response is the best ever LOL
shareBetter to be a tramp than a troll.
shareWhat a disgusting misogynist you are. A woman has much right to sexual freedom as a man. Women should have the same (cultural and legal) right to have sex with whomever they want, whenever they want. Just because the woman bears the child doesn't change that.
Perhaps if the society she lived in wasn't so patriarchal and disgusting, proper sexual prophylactics would've been available and she could've had safe sex in a way that she wanted and made her feel comfortable. What's more, perhaps the immoral society in which she lived should've enabled it so that abortions were safe procedures, rather than pushing them into dark alleys and back streets, having the ultimate effect of endangering lives.
You really need to deal with the psycho-sexual issues you're obviously carrying.
We must not check reason by tradition, but contrawise, must check tradition by reason - Leo Tolstoy
well, woman has to do more than a man! she just cant have sex like man does technically! how long men last? 10 minutes? 15 minutes? Unlike, a woman who can have an orgasm forever( actually that is not correct. They have climax like men do but they recover very quickly! It is horomonal release than like release for men).
Woman are the biggest carriers of the std because they receive it! If she ain't clean and have sex with other man( she can spread easily! Opinion of the doc).
It is not just that men woke up and started calling woman all these names. Infact woman also call these names to them!
So it is more than moral some times. And also men made the rules since the the beginnings! It is only that in modern era america and some occidental countries gave them equal rights in everything!
I cant remember as late as 2010 there was a huge debate even in wimbledon about equal prize money between men and woman( they eventually seem to have done it).
Both sexes are different though they are humans. But sexually more happens inside woman than men( may be that is why it all started)
For some reason men are hurt more in love! Even if you saw this film ( the ex-bf still cares for her unlike her! It is just like she does not know him anymore!).
A woman is not equal to men! Both are important( you cant clap with one hand can you?).
But the problem now has been woman want to do things men wanna do and forgot being a woman!
That is where problems crop up!
At the end of the day it all comes down to like my man James brown said "
It is a man's world but it aint nothing without woman or a girl"
Dig it?
Also, I'd like to comment on the remark that went something like "she probably knew all along he wanted kids and kept it from him...". It's like in The sopranos! when Adriana tells Christopher an abortion mistake may be the reason she may not be able to have kids. reaction : "You knew you wuh damaged hoods all the time and didn't tell me...?"
WOMEN ARE NOT MEANT TO BE A BROODMARE FOR MEN WHO WANT SONS TO PLAY CATCH WITH!!!
It hurt Mary at least as much, if not more, that her "mistake"might be the reason she might not have kids, and she was likely hoping against hope for years that wasn't the case.
Mc cloud was shown to be an irrational, unforgiving, damaged (by his childhood) lunatic. There is no argument or anything he stands for in this movie that is "right". Mary was certainly no tramp, and every one who commits a crime does not become a lifelong criminal. Painting with a broad brush and a little bit of knowledge are dangerous things, especially combined.
"It is hard to be a man of peace. It would be so pleasant to kill Mr. Weddle." - Massai, 'Apache'