The significance of the color white

Agreed. As it is traditionally accepted that white is the symbol for purity and good in the written work, it is the exact opposite in this movie. It is associated with all things dark and evil, while darkness is a good and decent thing. Catherine describes how her cousin allowed her to change into a dark and decent swimsuit after he was finished with her white swimsuit lure.

Yes, I never got that part either. What is the point in attracting a lot of straight men who were lusting after a beautiful woman? The only way that might have worked would be if his mother, Violet Venable would have "left" and "gotten a room" with a gentleman caller leaving numerous, over-stimulated straight men that Sebastian could offer compensation. Now honestly, in the timeframe this story was told, what do you think the men's response would be? Violence, pure and simple. I really have doubts that such a scheme would have worked for him sexually, but it sure gave a cautionary warning about over-stimulation to the movie-goers of the 50's.

Then again, people with heart conditions really shouldn't have sex, should they? Heart patients shouldn't be taking Viagra and the like, I've seen the warnings on TV commercials. Wouldn't Sebastian be aware his heart couldn't take it!

Could it be that Sebastian was looking for his own death, was looking to be murdered like the sea turtles and recreating the situation he witnessed on the beaches in the Galapagos Archipelago? Could he have invited and planned for his own death? Suicide by gaybashing?

Tired of life and aware that his mother was too old to over-stimulate and disappoint the huge crowd he needed to recreate this "face of God", he used Elizabeth Taylor's character {Catherine) and received the death he had dreamt about? Maybe Violet Venable KNEW what Sebastian was after and WOULDN'T do the dirty work, and Catherine, not knowing the sick death Sebastian desired, provided it for him unwittingly.

Maybe Sebastian was in fact pure and chaste like Violet implied. Maybe the surrounding natives really did want some food to eat or were tired of his mini-molestations for money. Or maybe even Sebastian's witty, colorful friends were all the physical attatchment he required. But it seems the only thing we can be absolutely sure about is that the mental status of Sebastian Venable was, without question, one of an insane but monetarily empowered man that couldn't go on in his limited inner world.

When Sebastian has met his end does any viewer miss him? I didn't. Throughout the film, as the I came to know him through others, I didn't like him, did you? He was annoying!!! His characteristics and alleged charm and humor and habits and taste bugged the fudge out of me! And if you are like me, you'll feel more compassion for the freshly-hatched sea turtles' death than you will for Sebastian at his untimely end. Sebastian's death and what brought it about interested me but I'm glad and relieved that he's gone. The sea turtles have my sympathy because they were trying to reach the ocean and live. Sebastian doesn't have my sympathy because he was going no place but trying to die. The only sorrow I feel over his death is that he got the spiritual adventure he had concocted for himself. You know that life isn't fair when people like Sebastian Venable always get what they want right up to the end.

There was too much of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in Sebastian's choice of death for me to ever feel pity or sorrow for him and I don't find Sebastian a God worth consuming at any Last Supper.

I got the feeling that the fact that Sebastian deliberately targeted straight men by using Aunt Vi (and later, Catherine) as decoys. Catherine said Sebastian became terrified when the young boys rushed the fence where they were having lunch -- he recognized some of the young men as having been "procured" for him earlier. I surmised from this that he brought the men in and then either liquored them up or offered them money for sexual favors, not caring that they were likely humiliated by what he did. If he had selected homosexual men they would not have been bent on revenge like the young men in Cabeza de Lobo.

Also, Catherine stated that he viewed people as like "items on a menu". "Fed up with brunettes", "famished for blondes", "that one looks appetizing", which means he was objectifying his targeted subjects, not seeing them as someone with feelings, merely someone to satisfy his desires, no matter whether they were gay themselves or not. So it is ironic that someone who referred to his objects of desire using words like "appetite" and "fed up" and "famished" met his end the way he did.

Life's a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death!