MovieChat Forums > Parents (1989) Discussion > Could Michael be the one? *spoilers*

Could Michael be the one? spoilers

posted 13 years ago by hippiedj
17 replies | jump to latest

I've always wondered, after first seeing this film back in 1989, if Michael could actually be the killer. After all, you never exactly see the "killer" like when Sandy Dennis is pushed into the closet -- the killer's hands are covered with gloves, the arms are childlike and seem to be pushing from a lower angle. While holding the knife, it comes through the door at the height of a child's. And when the parents talk about moving from one place to another, could it be because they knew of Michael's problems?

I'm fine with the idea that the parents were cannibals (they seem to be part of it all since the father mentions moving to a place near where there will be acidents), but this other idea seems just as plausible to me.

PARENTS is one of my all-time faves for sure!

[–] AddictedToOldE 12 years ago

For a split second I thought it was him killing the social worker, but if you pay attention, in one of the quick cuts you can [very briefly] see a dress (Mom) being worn by the killer.

[–] timlin-4 12 years ago

Norman Bates...

[–] DisturbedPixie 12 years ago

I honestly don't think this film is clever enough to pull a Psycho twist like that. And it seemed fairly obvious that after whoever killed the case worker, Michael wanted to stop his parents, when he tried to take down his dad. Why stop them and hurt his dad, and bring the case worker over, if he was the killer? And anyways, his parents don't seem to want to kill anybody, it's just about survival and eating his favorite food.

[–] gammapaladin 12 years ago

I think it's definitely clever enough. The whole movie is bizarre, the interactions in his family are so stilted and unnatural that they don't even seem to make sense in the context of his parents hiding a secret from him, but they seem to make more sense if they know something about him that he's repressing from his own consciousness.

I just watched it for the first time, and I felt it was left very much open to interpretation whether or not the parents were truly cannibals, whether it was simply a means for him to rationalize his own disconnection from them and disturbed psyche, whether it was all just in his mind, or whether it was all metaphor.

The writer seems to have gone out of his way to never have any other person corroborate Michael's view of events in the dialog, and that tells me he's trying to leave it open, or even expecting you to read between the lines. There's no reason for not showing you the social worker's killer unless you're meant to wonder who it was.

It seems to me that you can take it at a literal level, in which case it's a pretty crappy horror movie with poor writing, or you can try to interpret it, at which point it becomes a lot deeper and more interesting, and a lot better crafted.

I feel it was quite well written, and meant to leave you wondering. During my viewing I was constantly trying to figure out if this was really happening, or if Michael only thought it was.

I developed about 4 possible scenarios.

1) The obvious. His parents are cannibals and he discovers their secret. There are many problems with this though.

2) He witnessed his parents having sex and deals with it by creating this fantasy of what he really saw, which develops into a full blown psychosis, leading to hallucinations which serve to maintain his fantasy. I'm not a fan of this one because it's a bit Freudian, but it's possible the writer was going for that.

3) The above, but he kills the social worker to protect his fantasy, and maintains the delusion that his parents did it.

4) The whole thing is a metaphor. The movie is actually about him being molested by his father, and the cannibalism and violence is just a delusional fantasy he uses to rationalize that molestation. I'm kind of leaning towards this interpretation, honestly. It makes his extreme reaction to seeing his parents make out (Both times) more sensical. It explains the otherwise completely out of left field line his mother delivers early in the movie, "Did you take off your pajamas? You only have nightmares when you take off your pajamas.". It jives with the imagery of the sausage attacking him in the pantry. And it even explains the climax. The symbolism of his father trying to feed him a piece of meat is just obvious, and even the dialog in the scene works.

[–] rock0052 12 years ago

Interesting theses...I'll have to watch it again looking for the pieces to fit #4, that's the only one I hadn't considered yet.

I also thought that maybe Michael is gay and doesn't quite realize it yet. Maybe that's why it's even more horrifying to him when his parents have sex than it is by usual standards. That may explain his father's almost disgust with him, with Michael's youth and sexual confusion the cause of all the horrible visions. For example, in one of the scenes that should've upset him, the sausage almost seductively wraps itself around him in the closet- notice he doesn't fight it at all there. It seems like it's only when it has to do with his father that the fear of meat really rears itself, which lends some credibility to #4 on your list.

[–] Mehki_Girl 12 years ago

You know that last one makes a lot of sense. Especially, in light of his mom asking him if he took of his pajamas. I thought that was such an odd question/behavior. Also the sausages were quite phallic looking. I'm in the middle of watching it so I haven't watched he scene yet with the dad trying to feed him the meat.

[–] Danimal_77 10 years ago

Why would you come on here half-way through watching the movie? Why would you ruin the surprise for yourself? Why can't people just sit back and watch a movie the whole way through without feeling the incessant need to come online and discuss it WHILE watching it?

[–] Snyder2277 10 years ago

I just watched it again after reading this and I can definately see #4 now I couldn't before but it makes sense.

[–] Danimal_77 10 years ago

Watch the scene where Michael's father asks him if he needs help with his tie and starts to put it on while standing BEHIND him. While he is doing this, the mother looks disturbed and pretends she doesn't see what's going on and then the father says: see Michael, we have to FIT IN. This was a HUGE metaphor for the father have sexual relations with Michael, while the mother turns a blind eye.

Also, when the mother is being asked by the school psychologist if Michael and his father are close and she answers VERY and then she won't go specifically into WHAT EXACTLY they do together and then she looks down nervously.

And when Michael is over at the girls house and she play with him on the bed, she says: don't worry, it won't hurt and he says: please don't.

Also, at the end, when the father is going to feed Michael the meat (after he unties him) he walks over to Michael and says, here, let me feed you and then tells him that he will acquire the taste like his mother did and his mother then says that she learned to love it and then his father tells him to open up wide, while he's putting meat right into Michael's mouth. There was a bunch of sexual innuendos in that entire scene.

So YES, there is a STRONG insinuation that Michael is being sexually molested at home by his father, while his mother does nothing about, but again, A LOT is left ambiguous.

At the end, the mother stabs the father when he's taking Michael away. One could decipher from that, that she had enough and decided to finally protect her son from what he husband had been doing to him all along.

[–] hippiedj 9 years ago

Wow! So many great ideas about this! I really wish someone would release it with commentary and/or interviews. It would be so amazing to hear what Bob Balaban and Christopher Hawthorne had going on in their heads. Or perhaps convince magazines like Diabolique or Rue Morge to do a retrospective on it.

[–] nycboy94117 7 years ago

Vestron is releasing the Blu-Ray DVD on 1/31/17 with a whole bunch of special features including a DIRECTOR COMMENTARY!!! I'm so psyched about this!!!

[–] 7 years ago

[deleted]

[–] oceena 11 years ago

Twice during this acene, through the slats in the door, you can see someone (mom) wearing a green and yellow striped skirt. Watch closely.

[–] poe2299 12 years ago

"the father mentions moving to a place near where there will be acidents"

While they never say what his career is, he appears to be a coroner working at a toxicology lab. "more accidents" could mean "more business" and a better career.

[–] Cashew1189 12 years ago

I actually still believe Michael was the killer. My interpretation was that Michael was already a mentally disturbed child with a very vivid imagination/hallucinations (but was sent over the edge when he witnessed his parents "engaging" downstairs).

Yes, the father was very creepy but one has to take into account that we are viewing this through a child's eye. Nick was very hard on Michael because as he said, Michael was nothing like him. He viewed the boy (I feel) as weird and wimpy..and those feelings were intensified when the kid refused to eat meat. As a vegetarian myself, I can tell you I've had those looks of "the girl ain't right" just because the thought of eating meat is revolting (no judgment to those that eat meat..it's just my personal preference). The father was probably disappointed and lacked the understanding of his son (his aversion to meat and mental instability) therefore frightened his son because of his frustration.

The pantry scene: personally I don't think the "Psycho" theory is too far off. Yes..we do see the mother's watch and blue dress..but try to follow me here. We all know Michael had experienced hallucinations (the severed leg/dead body outside the window), it is my thought that in his mind he was seeing his mother kill the counselor and perhapse REALLY believed it, but in fact it was part of his psychosis. The angle in which the knife enters the pantry is right at "child level".

When the father talks about people not understanding and they will burn them because of their secret, perhapse he was referring to their sons' mental illness. He may have killed before.

I don't know..I watched this literally an hour ago so my mind may change.

I'm really glad someone brought up the Fruedian possibility. The movie could have very well been about a boy's learning of sexuality..consuming (taking in) another person, blood (mixing of bodily fluids), the fear of the unknown...it makes perfect sense.

[–] nycboy94117 7 years ago

WOW!!! You brought such a fresh perspective to the analysis. Vestron is releasing the Blu-Ray DVD with a ton of special features as well as a directors commentary! I am definitely going to buy the blu ray and listen to the commentary and understand the directors vision.

[–] bdhrentertainment 8 years ago

1.) Michael didn't kill Sandy Dennis' character. You can see the mom's dress when Dennis' character is being killed.

2.) Michael isn't being molested. The parents are very flirty with each other when they tell Michael it's time to go to bed. Michael walks in on them as they're about to get it on. You can see that there's sexual attraction between the mom & dad throughout. If Michael was being molested, I doubt the dad would be into the mom and vice versa.

3.) However, it's obvious Shelia is being abused to some degree. That remains ambiguous.

4.) The dad isn't a coroner. He creates chemicals. This is shown when he presents a demo on how to destroy rain forest type environments. He experiments on human cadavers to see how they would react to these chemicals.

5.) Supporting the cannibalism idea is the film's portrait of excess, consumerism and maintaining a certain image:

-The mom prepares lavish meals, because that's what a Sally Homemaker type was supposed to do in the 50's.
-The mom has all the latest kitchen appliances.
-The mom's pantry is stocked in over abundance.
-On top of having a fully stocked fridge, the parents have a freezer as well.
-The parents have a variety of wines in the cellar.
-Camera compositions are used to make rooms in the house appear larger throughout.
-Their car is large, spacious and always looks immaculate.
-Even when completing day to day duties, the mom always looks immaculate and has her jewelry on.
-Even in smaller details - when going to bed, Michael wears an undershirt, then PJ's, then he has a rob. He has all these layers of clothes stacked on top of him.
-This extends to the mom as well. She has that hoop thing underneath her dress. Then she has a big dress on. Then she's outfitted with jewelry. Even when visiting the school social worker, she has gloves on. She has on just about every piece of clothing on that you can think of.
-The dad purposely pours the drink on the mom, during the card game, to maintain appearances since the mom is getting drunk. That's also why the dad talks with the son before heading out, because they have to hold onto their image and the son could mess that up. That's supported again when the dad talks about how they could come and try to burn the family.

-The metaphor in all of this is that the parents have to have everything and that includes eating people.

6.) The movie isn't so much about childhood or even the relationship between kids & adults, but of consumerism & excess and how that leads people to try to hold onto a perfect image.

-I stated some points above the support that above. Also...
-Sandy Dennis discovers that the parents are cannibals. Then she gets killed, because she discovers that they aren't so perfect.
-In killing Sandy Dennis' character and cooking her up, they get to indulge even more so in excess.
-The father is stealing meat from the plant. IE: His excess leads to him stealing from his job.
-Michael refuses to partake in the parents excess by never eating any of the lavish meals they prepare.
-When the parents try to force Michael to indulge in their excess, Michael rebels by stabbing the dad. Since Michael is a liability to their excess, the dad states that they can simply have another kid. To the father, the son is another product that they can simply replace.
-The mom tries to hold onto what they have, by stabbing the dad.
-The dad stabs the mom, because she's another liability.
-At the end, the dad is tripping about their house. He falls down the stairs. He pulls the pipe (which causes the house to explode). The wine rack comes falling down on him. It's all symbolic of how his excess is turning against him.
-When Michael kisses the mom, the dad asks Michael why he doesn't get one. If the mom gets everything, the dad has too as well.
-The dad is mad about the lack of relationship between him and the son. Since the mom has that, he has to have that as well.