MovieChat Forums > Damage (1993) Discussion > Anna *contains spoilers*

Anna contains spoilers

posted 17 years ago by wdflwr
6 replies | jump to latest

I just saw this movie for the first time this evening. I found it extremely painful to watch, but yet couldn't turn it off.

I think Anna set up this relationship of herself entwined between father & son as a way of replaying her relationship with her brother when she was a child and his resulting suicide.

Since she chose these two related characters, and knew very well the dangers that were involved, she was putting herself in a position of regaining power; the very power she lost in being a victim of incest, and the power she lost with her brother committing suicide because of her relationship with a boyfriend.

Her brother did the two very worst things to her that could be done - she was a victim of incest and then, when she found a boyfriend, he killed himself to get even with her. Through setting up this relationship with father & son; she gets to replay the event - only this time she calls the shots. The fiances death liberates her. The son never stood a chance in this relationship, her intention all along was to turn him into her brother and see him die on her terms.

Abusive relationships have a way of worming their way into the psyche of people and it is very difficult to break that pattern. This movie is one of the best examples of the cycles of abuse that I can think of.

[–] JacquesDemy 17 years ago

I haven't read the novel, but I watched some Louis Malle's other movies recently, and I think he would believe the incest between Anna and her brother just happened naturally through love and intimacy. There is no abusive relationships and it is not anyone's fault.

[–] ColinHarvey 16 years ago

Putting on my psychologist hat for a moment...

When there is incest, there is always some form of abuse, whether the participants realise it or not.

I've seen it too many times in my professional work and study.

[–] speechfork 16 years ago

"When there is incest, there is always some form of abuse, whether the participants realise it or not."

Agreed.

[–] geatorgold 16 years ago

JacquesDemy, what you say is what many child abusers say. Most of them don't think they are doing anything wrong - they see it as part of being "close" to each other. You may be talking about the innocent kind of touching that toddlers do, but that's not what happened with Anna & her brother.

[–] lornamd-1 17 years ago

I don't think Anna had any way of knowing that the son would die but apart from that I agree with most of your opinions on the film. When Anna's mother said that Martin resembled the dead brother I took that to mean that she is hurting Martin as a way of getting back at her brother.

[–] ecjones1951 16 years ago

Abusive relationships have a way of worming their way into the psyche of people and it is very difficult to break that pattern. This movie is one of the best examples of the cycles of abuse that I can think of.

Anna, of course, is abusing Martyn, who is more fleshed out in the book, but in neither place is any match for her guile and cunning. Martyn is a weak sister from the beginning, blithely and unquestioningly meeting all Anna's demands, most importantly her desire for complete freedom. He just subsumes his personality to hers. Can he really be so naive as to think he can hold on to her, or that they will ever be equals?

Love is blind; Martyn is captivated and intrigued by Anna's opacity and mystery. The notion that she might be a manipulative psychological cripple, or that she can make him one never occurs to him, and so he remains strangely unsympathetic. Notice how he looks like a confused, troubled little boy when he walks into the block of flats where his father and fiancee are upstairs. A lamb to the slaughter.

Whom did Anna choose first? Martyn or his father? What does she really mean when she tells Stephen, "do you think I would have married Martyn if I couldn't have you?" The center of Anna's world has always been Peter, and no matter who she hurts, no matter how selfish and single-minded she may be, she always comes back to Peter, and he always takes her back. Like everyone else who loves her or who falls into her trap, Peter is also clearly willing to allow himself to be abused by Anna to some degree. (It's noteworthy that Peter is a psychiatrist in the book, which makes things a little more interesting.)