MovieChat Forums > Georgy Girl (1966) Discussion > Why does Meredith have the baby?

Why does Meredith have the baby?


I suppose I can answer my own question: for the plot, correct?

reply

Well, yes, it is vital to the plot. However, I believe it is also used a means to show us the TRUE natures of ALL involved. It reinforces what we are shown about the values of the main characters. We are not meant to like Meredith, and LOVE Georgy. Her having the baby and " hating it " typifies how she operates.

At least that's MY take on it !

reply

Meredith says in the movie that she's already destroyed 2 others (babies).
Why she goes through with this one only to give it up and marry Bates just to leave him is a plot device.

reply

I believe its also to show the flightiness of Meredith. I think she decides to have the baby as a whim, an attempt to grow up, mature. The same reason she wanted to marry Jos.

Of course, it was a plot device also. But to strengthen her reasons and her character would just have detracted from Georgy. Its call "Georgy Girl" not...um "Meredith Mama"???

reply

I think part of it, too, was seeing herself thru Georgy's eyes. Meredith did love Georgy, and could see the joy and excitement mirrored there. And, having what Georgy craved was part of her wicked nature!

reply

She hated the idea of having a baby, she hated being preganant, she hated any talk about babies and she hated the baby when it was born.

All n all, a sad situation.

reply

She hated the idea of having a baby, she hated being preganant, she hated any talk about babies and she hated the baby when it was born.

All n all, a sad situation.
I agree that it's a sad situation. But I'm more sad for Meredith that I am for anyone else, because I think her anger masks her own frustration with herself. When she would lash out at everyone else every time they talked about pregnancy and baby stuff, it wasn't them that she was really lashing out at, it was the subject matter, and only because she couldn't relate to it.

Imagine – everyone's having a great time, except you! That kind of joy that Georgie and the other characters found in the subject of children – that kind of joy completely eluded Meredith. It isn't fair either, is it? Because who knows – if she had the choice, she would feel that joy, wouldn't she? Because who wouldn't choose to feel joy if they could? The point is, she couldn't, and that's the sadness.

That being said, I love the fact that she was so honest about her feelings, when most people would probably be too afraid to tell the truth on those matters, for fear that they would be looked down on. But Meredith didn't seem to mind what people thought of her. And the more I realize the pressures that she was put under, just because of what people thought of her, the more I am glad that she didn't care about that sort of thing.

Please excuse typos/funny wording; I use speech-recognition that doesn't always recognize!

reply

I don't feel that it was a weakness of the movie that she went ahead and had it for the sake of the plot. I think it makes it more like the complexity of real life. Meredith was an unlikable person. Still, she's not pure evil. I think she decided to have it in a moment of good intention to do the mature thing, or perhaps felt guilty that she had had two abortions already. But when push came to shove and she actually had it, her shallow selfish nature won out.

reply

Meredith is a "now" girl. She lives for the "now" and the mere "doing" of things. She tells Jos why she wants to have the baby when she announces her pregnancy (as she tries to weedle her way around asking him to marry her), and I believe this was her most sincere admittance of her feelings about the subject.

"I'm bored."

I believe this was the truth to how Meredith felt. She was bored with her life, and wanted something 'different' and 'exciting'. As she'd said, she'd already had two pregnancies terminated...this was something she'd experienced and didn't want to go through a third time. She wanted something ultimately different...

Only it backfires just like all of Meredith's "long term" plans. She gets bored of being pregnant, only it's far too along for her to change her mind. And once the baby is born, the pain sours any remaining desire to be a mother that she might have had. But she'd had the experience, she'd lost interest, she'd moved on.

It would probably be the last time she would ever let herself fall pregnant too, and considering all the men she was knocking about with, I sincerely doubt that Jos was the real father of the baby either...I do believe however, he had been the father of the previous two.

So all in all, she has the baby because she can and because she wants to experience the pregnancy out of boredom and wanting to try her hand at a different side of life...one that she feels she really wasn't cut out for.

reply

It did seem out of character for Meredith as she was presented. I have to go with those, including the OP, who looked outside the story to the writers. Sometimes there just isn't enough in terms of character motivation to have caused a certain action and it's really just something the author wants to happen. In this case it completely changes the tone of the movie to something more serious and sets up the last third of the film.

reply

Meredith decided to have the baby, because she was immature and thought that she'd be having a cute, cuddly dolll, but didn't think of the future; babies don't remain little, cute and cuddly all their lives, and Meredith found that out...the hard way.

reply