MovieChat Forums > Mumsy, Nanny, Sonny & Girly (1970) Discussion > How is the whole thing maintained?

How is the whole thing maintained?


The thing that got me about this film is not once do any of the family break out of the fantasy or question it.

Why?

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It's not "sci-fi", it's SF!

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Also how is the whole thing maintained financially? Where is the father? I think if you start asking these sorts of questions then you become in danger of destroying the whole thing. It's best to just accept the whole premise.

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"how is the whole thing maintained financially? "

Easy, inherited money, although one notices that the place is actually falling apart, so presumably the money is less than it once was. Nanny has obviously been with the staff for a long while, although there is no cook. Possibly a gardener judging by the mowed lawns.

The father could have been the breadwinner, and has died. Seems obvious.

But this is not the question I was asking at all.

Why don't any of them ever question what they're doing?

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It's not "sci-fi", it's SF!

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Girly at least seems to come out of it a bit after being with New Friend in the shed... telling New Friend that he is 'naive' and admonishing Sonny about his 'childish games'.

Also... I get a feeling that none of the 'happy family' are actually related... and that the whole situation may have been going on for quite a long time... with Mumsy at one time being the Girly... various children being abducted into the group.
Perhaps there was a Daddy at one time, maybe there will be again...

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The idea that none of them are related.

Maybe they used to abduct children once...

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It's not "sci-fi", it's SF!

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Why don't they come out of it? They're all pretty deluded. Sonny makes snuff films and seems to have experience in human hunting, and Nanny seems to have experience chopping through doors with an axe. Girly's obviously taken a few heads off. These people have been kidnapping and killing for years-- if they're that far out of their minds, a continuous roleplay isn't far out of the question.

The movie and the play are completely different creatures, but at least in the stage play, it's made clear that Daddy abandoned the family sometime after forcing Mumsy to have a hysterectomy, and that her obsession with having more children is at the root of "The Game." Writer Brian Comport says in his commentary that he never really considered the Daddy figure when scripting the movie, though.

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Can you tell us a bit more about the play please? (I imagine it's unlikely I'll ever see it staged)

I saw it was adapted from a play on the credits, but couldn't visualise how it would be done (although many of the scenes are indoor)

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It's not "sci-fi", it's SF!

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The play is VERY different, and, having seen Girly first, it stands as a testament to Brian Comport's creativity and imagination.

Off the bat, some of the stand-out differences:

The entirety of the play takes place in the living room of the house.

Nanny is much older-- 70 years old, according to the list of characters.

Other than Nanny, the costumes are also completely different. The script calls for Mumsy to spend the entirety of the play in a baggy bathrobe, and Girly and Sonny dress like mods-- frilly white shirts, a black suit for Sonny and a black skirt with suspenders for Girly (who also wears a panama hat). Both of them are chain smokers.

There are no snuff movies

There is no "Friend in Five" character

When they're onstage together, Sonny and Girly speak most of their lines in unison and really only have individual dialogue when one or the other is off stage

The "medicine" that everyone takes round the kitchen table is specified to be gin, and Mumsy and Nanny get hammered on it

Nanny disposes of bodies by burying them out in the garden (which can be seen through the living room window)

The first half of the play is about what happens when they bring home "Chick"-- who is sort of both Soldier and New Friend. He's a homeless 20-year-old, and the children have picked him up in the park. He's got the ill-manners of Soldier, but like New Friend starts to play along with the game once he recognizes the potential benefits (ie, Mumsy and Girly). Chick participates in "The Game" (which is a lot more innocuous and just kind of weird-- one scene opens with him wearing a paper crown and writing out "A Boy's best friend is his mumsy" over and again on ruled paper as though he's in detention) and there's no dead girlfriend to blackmail him with. It comes out that The Game originated when Daddy, who didn't want any more children, made Mumsy have a hysterectomy (called "having the major"), but then shortly thereafter abandoned her. Sonny plots against Chick, but not because he's upsetting the status quo; rather, Sonny is upset because he's bisexual and wants to get it on with Chick, who has no interest. Chick gets wise to Sonny's plotting and encourages Girly to kill him, which she does by pushing him off the banister (which, it's implied, Girly and Mumsy have done to previous "friends"). Chick then assumes the Sonny role, and he and Girly scout out a New Friend, an 18 year old named Doll-- as Chick wants to create a harem of sorts for himself. Doll, however, turns out to be a lesbian/bisexual (it's never specified which), and forms an attachment to Girly, and they begin speaking in unison. Doll starts to ponder knocking one of them off in order to maintain his newfound power. Before he can, though, Mumsy and Nanny get smashed on gin and Mumsy admits that she only really wanted children in the first place because of societal expectations. She and Nanny admit that they've been in love with one another for years and decide to start a new life together. The play ends with Mumsy and Nanny killing Girly, Chick, and Doll with poisoned berry sundaes; as they eat, Mumsy reads them a bedtime story while Nanny sinisterly enters the room carrying the shovel she's going to use to bury them in the garden. Girly, Chick, and Doll all fall over on the floor gagging and choking as Mumsy and Nanny cackle, and the curtain falls.

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Thanks for that. It seems that not much was retained except the main characters and the scenario.

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It's not "sci-fi", it's SF!

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For the better, too, honestly. It's really not that well written or thought-out. I suppose the basic themes are the same-- the dissolution of societal status-quo in the face of free love and the beat/mod/hippie cultures, but Comport and Francis do it a thousand times better than Mosco, whose characters aren't that terribly compelling, or even all that interesting. I dare say that the play's obscurity is richly deserved, and only worthy of a glance for the purposes of comparing it to the film version.

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[deleted]

Because they are mental.

"All I want, is to enter my hoes justified"

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