So many people seem to misunderstand why Hurt repeats what she signs...
A lot of people here are saying that it's a shame the movie opted to have the James Leeds character repeat everything that Sarah is signing to him verbally, instead of just showing their conversations in subtitles...
Most people say that this is the result of the film-makers trying to pander to the notoriously short attention spans of mainstream audiences or else that the film-makers were too afraid to depart too much from the original Broadway play.
This may be true, but people have forgotten there is a very important dramatic reason why William Hurt's character repeats verbally what Marlee Matlin's character is saying...
The whole point of the film is that James Leeds wants to assimilate Sarah into his world, he thinks that by doing so he will be doing her a big favour... the unspoken implication being that she is something broken that needs fixing.
Leeds' way of verbalising what she's signing is a manifestation of his unconcious arrogance - his "selfish altruism", as it were...
Basically, what I am trying to say, it is an important part of his character.
Not having James repeat to himself what Sarah is signing would make him into a very different character indeed... having James and Sarah's signing conversations unfold in total silence with subtitles would make him a different character:
- It would show him making a more genuine effort to live in Sarah's world and understand her way of living.
- Likewise, it would make Sarah's disgust and indignation at his behavior less reasonable if the film had shown him making that much of an effort to enter her world... rather than just paying "lip service" to her world as he does in the movie, whilst simultaneously holding out hope that he can somehow coax and manipulate her into being part of his.
Am I alone here? Am I the only one who thinks that having Leeds speak what he's signing was not simply a device for the filmmakers to avoid using subtitles?
Am I the only one who thinks that removing Leeds' verbalisations would throw much of the dramatic arc of the story way out of whack?