Please explain Alice shower scene?


I watch this movie on TCM last night and thought it was very well done, but why was everyone concerned when Alice was in the shower towards the end of the movie. I think it had something to do with the "Sailor" dying during the derby.
Someone please explain it to me.

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WELL......SIMPLY PUT.......WHEN YOU STAY AWAKE FOR A MONTH AND A HALF DANCING ....AND YOUR ONLY GIVEN LITTLE BREAKS TO REST......YOU GET VERY FLAKEY!!! (SLEEP DEPRIVATION) AND WHEN THE SAILOR HAD A HEART ATTACK AND COLLASPED IN FRONT OF ALICE.......WELL.....SHE GOT SHOOK!! AND SOMEHOW HE FELL ON HER, TOUCHED HER HAND OR SOMETHING....AND SHE MIGHT HAVE FELT RESPONSIBLE(In her sleep deprived state) OR MAYBEY THAT BECAUSE HE TOUCHED HER.....SHE MIGHT DIE NEXT.............SHE WENT TO THE SHOWER TO WASH OFF ANY BAD VIBES OR SPELL HE MIGHT HAVE PUT ONTO HER?? (Just my theory) SO.......THE BOTTOM LINE IS........GET YOUR 7-8 HOURS OF REST EVERY NIGHT........(Or you might be taking showers with your clothes on......LOL) (SLAPSTICK BOY)

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That's too much speculation. Why would the people get all concerned with her taking a damn shower?

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To the original poster, you have to pay closer attention - it's apparent from some of her dialogue at one point.

And to the last comment, it's not just a shower when someone takes it --with their clothes on and weirded-out eyes like that..!

Well done scene!

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What dialogue? If you're going to take the time to post, you may as well actually answer the question.

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In short, she was freaking out because someone died on top of her. When the sailor had a heart attack he fell and his head touched her leg. She was already going through a nervous breakdown on top of being awake and on her feet for hours at time, the sailor's death was the straw that broke the camel's back so as mentioned before she was trying to wash off the reminder of death.

And if you don't get why everyone looked at her weird then what scene where you watching??? The women got into a shower fully clothed, with eyes the size of saucers, on their 10 minute rest, not saying a word to anyone, looking a million miles out of her own mind. She had lost it and everyone knew but they were just shocked as to how far gone she was.

Watch the entire film over again if you didn't get or see any of that.



RIP Paul Newman 1925-2008. Words can't express how much you will be missed.

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During the derby. Sailor is obviously having a mortal attack. Robert and Alicia watch in horror as they themselves race together. Clearly, he is dead before the race is over, having only been dragged by desperate Gloria to the finish line, which everyone realizes when he falls to the ground, brushing against Alicia in some manner.

As horrifying as this for all, it is hardest on Alicia. From the moment we are introduced to her at the beginning, she is clearly an emotionally fragile creature, perhaps having had a very sheltered life with a family in a country far away, now totally lost in the brutal realities of the Depression.

We have watched her deteriorate emotionally up to now, and the death of Sailor pushes her totally over the edge. She has probably never seen anyone die before, and she is confronted with the primal terror of dead things for the first time.

She goes into the shower to wash "death" from her, to cleanse herself from its contamination and perhaps erase the reality the bitter turn her life has taken by being alive during this bleak era.

The others enter the shower room reacting in their own way to Sailor's death, and understand immediately. as she stands there wild eyed in her gown, that she has had a psychotic episode.

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I'm wondering whether this movie popularized the notion that insane or traumatized people are trying to wash off certain events or have the sensation of bugs crawling under their skin?
BTW, I concur with the original poster in that I didn't understand why everybody made such a fuss about her showering with her underkex on either.

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[deleted]

Thanks Besctu.

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To becstu:

Congratulations for creating the most worthless post in IMDb history. Party hard...you earned it!

"...if that was off, I'd be whoopin' your ass up and down this street." ~ an irate Tarantino

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They Shoot Horses Don't They has a very popular title, and most people know it's about a dance marathon durning the Great Depression, but,(I am sure), there are plently of people don't really have a clue as to what the title really refers to. Or about Alice's shower scene.


If you read cookiechooks explanation of this film, maybe you, too, will understand what it's all about.



"If you can make a girl laugh, you can make her do anything!"

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Macbeth has been doing that for hundreds of years.

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Thank you, chookiechooks, for fully articulating the matter. Your last sentence in particular is the full reply to the OP's question. The others in the scene can immediately see by her facial expression and by the fact that she is showering in her (only) gown that she is having a mental breakdown.

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The sound quality on the DVD I just watched was mediocre but I thought I heard her say twice "He touched me". I quickly assumed that Sailor had raped her and his death was the catalyst to recall the horror she felt when she was attacked, though after re-reading this thread I think the other explanation being offered here by chookiechooks as more plausible.

Has anyone read the book?

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I agree with all of these theories and, as a person fascinated with human psychology, am compelled to add my own two cents about this memorable scene. It's a little convoluted, but just bear with me for a second.

While her mental illness was growing all the time the longer she was sleep-deprived (as was everyone's), we learn that (like Gloria) Alice lacks the ability to function emotionally and healthily and as a result places all of her concern on material things, like her dress. When Alice discovers the destroyed dress, which is her last material possession in the world, it represents her psychological death and she realizes how empty and lonely her life is. When the sailor dies and touches her ruined dress as he does so, the dress that Alice's "conscious" and empty life revolved around and which now is "tainted" by death, her conscious mind dies along with the dress and the sailor and she becomes trapped in her distorted subconscious. She gets in the shower to try in vain to wash away the "death" that has spread to her basically. It doesn't work of course, and at that point her only outlet from a world she can't connect with spiritually is to descend completely into insanity where she is "safe".

The same thing is true with Gloria when her nylon rips, which was her own last material possession and which she says she had saved up for for months to buy. But instead of lapsing into catatonia like Alice, she falls completely into hopeless depression and doesn't have the ability to "escape" her now empty and cruel world through schizophrenia, so she realizes the only escape for her now is to die. They're both cases of imbalanced brain chemistry and unresolved traumas from these women's past that grows steadily worse over time until it "peaks", which is when they have completely exhausted their serotonin/dopamine response. This hormonal imbalance is the underlying force of all mental illness, depression, addiction, etc, and the fact that this movie can make us aware of this the more we watch it is where its value as true art comes into play.

I'd love to read some more comments and theories from others about this scene as a passionate film buff!

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How fascinating - thanks for those opinions.

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She was taking a shower fully clothed in her only dress, ten minutes before she had to go back on the dance floor to wash the dead man's touch away. This was a woman who packed peroxide and makeup and silk dresses because she was hoping to be discovered. She probably even put out for Rocky. (Care to go over your lines in my office?)

But she had the looks but not the talent, so it wasn't going to happen. As Gloria said, life was rigged against the before they even got there...just like central casting.

She had a breakdown when she recognized the marathon as the deathly folly that is was. Seeing Gloria drag a dead man across the finish line was too much for her, but she had nowhere else to go.

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It should be pointed out that it began with her brother. If he was killed in the Battle of the Somme, it's likely he died when she was a pre-teen and that she had never quite recovered from his death. In other words, she was a member of the Lost Generation (British people aged between 14 and 21 during the 1920s).
I think she had been using her ambition of becoming a Hollywood star to escape from that reality. She tried to stay in that bubble of escapism during the marathon, but a crack appeared when her dress went missing. It went downhill from thereon, with each crack showing up along the way, ending with Sailor's death which shattered the bubble she created after her brother's death sixteen years ago.

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[deleted]

I know more than seven years have passed since you said this but I think like the others already said: she showered with clothes on, she was half in shock by the fact that sailor died on her legs. Besides that, I think she took a cold shower. There's no condense/watersmoke and she turns purple after a while. Must have been very cold. (Sorry for my English, couldn't find all the words I needed )

Favorite movies/year plus little review: http://www.imdb.com/list/ls070235838/

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I'm confused by the fact that anyone needs this explained to them. It's obvious she was having a nervous breakdown after witnessing the sailor's death—watching someone die in a normal state of mind is traumatizing enough, so imagine having it happen after you've been on your feet dancing for 1,000+ hours with minimal breaks and sleep deprivation.

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Psychosis caused by sleep deprivation. It can happen to anyone if you go a few days without any sleep, now imagine how common this kind of thing was when you're essentially awake for months and only resting 10 minutes every 2 hours.

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