Did he rape Helen in the end?
"Where's the sherbert, mother?"
"It's there, beneath the layer of protective ice..."
I doubt that flaming homosexual was a rapist. Helen would have never been able to doodle with his dead noodle!
shareHelen's hallucinating/psychotic episodes seem to be triggered by her
cutting/pricking herself: the opening scene when she's cut causes her to dwell on
her husband's death; her compulsion to touch the whirring fan backstage causes her
to hallucinate and suffer a mental breakdown. Hamilton Starr ("two r's, but
prophetic nonetheless!") most certainly doesn't rape her, (how could you think
it?!?); however she does prick her hand on the white rose he offers her (a token
of friendship, and, for Helen, a symbol of religious purity, just like her white
rabbits), triggering her into a grand guignol display of bloodstained psychosis
- in sending her rabbits to a 'better place', and finally, preventing the object
of her affections (Adele) from ever achieving her own Hollywood happy ending
(ie. Heterosexual marriage!) and, like Baby Jane's dancing on the beach, ends
the film triumphantly restaging her and Adele's kiddy-star review rehearsal. As
for Hamilton Starr, he disappears from the film just as mysteriously as he
enters!
Although a wonderfully flamboyant, Wildean figure, and evidently sympathetic
with Helen's emotional state, his slick entrances and exits also make him, for a
time, a red herring, who may or may not be the asthmatic voice sending Adele and
Helen abusive, threatening phonecalls..... He no longer serves a narrative
purpose once Helen's final state has been triggered, and presumably has returned
back to his "dreary hotelroom", as he tells Helen. The officer's arrival reveals
the true identity of the man Helen killed.... a thought-provoking, rather
stylish, if slightly uneven horror thriller, but an absolute must-see for fans
of the Grande Dame-Grande Guignol cycle of the 60s and 70s.
I don't know, I always thought he raped her. Why does he look so menacingly at her as he follows her up the back stairs (the last time we see him)?
shareThere's nothing in the film to suggest Hamilton Starr has any erotic interest in Helen or any woman whatsoever: -(he and Adelle are platonic friends, enjoying 'camping' together): the scene rather suggests his empathy for her, as he shows awareness that she's afraid of him. Again he's still a red herring and thus ambiguous - he suggests Bela Lugosi - although he does remove the thorns from the stem of the white rose he offers her, with his penknife, muttering, "Always a thorn, isn't there?" suggesting concern. It's being a white rose indicates purity and honour. A red rose would've been more telling of intentions! (Freudian, I know!)
Finally, Helen clearly would protect herself from any man who attempted to touch her - and was evidently equipped to do so, if we remember the mysterious stranger who is pushed down the stairs, and who is later revealed to be their anonymous phonecaller; allaying Helen's guilt.
Any film from the 1970s which incorporated a harrowing rape would capitalise on it, exploiting the scene to its utmost - this was 1971 remember, the year of A Clockwork Orange and Straw Dogs, both of which include very graphic scenes of rape, to show how unpleasant they are. The issue of rape in Helen would throw the narrative off balance: we understand Helen's antipathy of men touching her, through her experience of marriage: but her mental breakdowns through the film, and the one which results in the death of her rabbits and Adelle, are suggested to be the consequence of her cutting herself, and not the consequence of being sexually molested!
Great post. I just watched this gem for the first time, and you explained a lot. Thanks.
"I love corn!"
QUOTE:
just like her white rabbits), triggering her into a grand guignol display of bloodstained psychosis
I think it's unfortunate we never really see what happened between them. I don't suspect he attacked her, but it's possible she may have killed him. We have no way of knowing. However, it seems most likely he simply set her off and it was just the rabbits she killed.
"Now let's have an intelligent conversation. I'll talk and you listen."